Autumn Cleaning

Summer vacation is over. School is back in session. Beach towels, lawn chairs, and bathing suits have been cleaned, washed off, and put away until next year. You could call it fall cleaning (the slightly cooler weather second-cousin to spring cleaning, but there is more than can be done than getting the house ready for autumn and winter. It can be time to clean your computer.

Take fifteen minutes a day, or if you have the time a half-hour or an hour, to do things like:

• Wipe the fingerprints off the screen
• Vacuum out the sand or other tiny granules that have found their way between the keys

• Back Up... back up... back up your hard drive
• Delete unneeded files (Yes, I put back up and delete in that order for a reason. You may have a slightly larger backup, but if you find out you need a file, the odds are better you will have it. If you delete first, there is no backup if you find you really didn't mean to get rid of it.

• Organize emails into folders and delete emails that contain dated or inaccurate information
• If you use a universal link, rescan it to see if any additional sites now carry your books
• Update pre-release posts and cover reveals to include the sales sites

 
There is another computer-related item that will apply to many of us. Update the website. Now I'm not just talking about cleaning out old posts that are no longer relevant. If a broken link scan hasn't been performed in a while, this is a good time to do so before the busy autumn season. Results of the check were a total of 3000 pages scanned and 57 broken links found. A couple were my fault where I put in the placeholder title of the article it was to link back to rather than the actual URL. Me bad. Then there were a couple where the author changed their website without putting in a redirect. They bad.

The items that constituted the most broken links were the result of the changing world.

• An ebook site going away
• A site's reorganization of their archives
• Sales sites no longer valid for books that were showcased on my site and which are no longer available or an updated version was published which resulted in a different ASIN, ISBN, and URL.

~till next time, Happy Cleaning, Halen

Guilty or Just Delightful? #mfrwauthor

This year's challenge is just not fair. They keep making us choose. First we had to choose one from all the books, novels, short stories or anything else we've written. Now they want us to choose an indulgence. Just one.

Is it food or time alone?  A special meal or a treat? An airline seat upgrade or a special accessory in my truck.

Last year's discussion of a similar topic has examples that appeared in my books (and my heart.) This year I added a stylus for my PC/tablet as an indulgence. I wanted to be able to write and draw without using keyboard or mouse. So far I haven't found a stylus that will work with any of my computers. A pen mouse was tried and that didn't work either. So I'm back to a finger or the old-fashioned click mouse. Scratch one indulgence off the list. Time for add something else to the list.

And your answer as to my favorite indulgence? I won't decide and you can't make me.

It's a hop be sure to visit the posts for more indulgences. ~till next time, Helen

Weakness Makes Us Strong #MFRWAuthor

Those that know me, know that there is a line beyond which I won't divulge personal information. So how to handle the prompt, "My Greatest Weakness." I finally decided to start off with a quote from a song that for me has become my personal theme. But no, using the lyrics from "As Good As I Once Was" would violate copyright. But I trust from the title you can tell that the weakness I'm discussing is age.

A lady never reveals her true age. That said, I admit to having passed the double nickel. By whatever grace or luck, I am able to do pretty much everything I used to, just not as long or as often. (Hence the reason the song is on the spindle). I can still type the same number of words as when I aced the skill exam for my first "professional" job, but the fingers get stiffer and typing becomes more of a chore after a few hours. More important (and frustrating) is the reduced ability to multi-task. Instead of juggling eight or ten or even 12 tasks simultaneously, focus is concentrated on one thing at a time.

And as for the title of the post? Fingerless gloves keep fingers more nimble. From weakness came a strength--greater organization. Organization ensures the single task is done more efficiently and hopefully quicker. Click on the list below to see what the other authors are sharing.

~till next time, Helen

Name the Blosson - Rose or Tulip? #MFRWauthor

Among the first things that catch a reader's attention is a book cover, the back page blurb, and the title. Several considerations go into selecting the perfect title. Too long and it might be forgotten. Titles need to be evergreen or at the very least adhere to contemporary rules.

For me the hardest part of selecting a title was finding one that was not already in use. The perfect title is conceived, then your hopes are dashed with a quick online search. A book in your genre was released just six months earlier with the same title.

"Titles aren't copyrighted," your inner self urged. "Go ahead and use it."

However, copyright isn't the primary consideration. Recognition is. If you use the same title as a popular book, yours will appear far, far back in the search results. There might be a coat-tail effect, where readers looking for the other book stumble across yours and decide to give it a try. But it is just as likely a possibility of a backlash when they realize your book was not the one they really wanted.

Selecting a title is even more difficult when the standalone book became a series. So here's the story behind the titles of the Dragshi Chronicles. You'll notice that the keyword shifted between the first book in the series and the rest. That's because when the titles were being selected, it seemed like every combination with "dragon" was in use. And I had to have "dragon" as that was a critical component of the story.

The Dragshi Chronicles

Dragon Destiny
Hatchlings Curse
Hatchling's Mate
Hatchling's Vengeance

Dragon Destiny was chosen to reflect the hopes of Lord Branin Llewlyn of the dragshi that the trader girl Anastasia would have a destiny as half of a dragon-human pairing. Hatchlings Curse hinted at the price paid for the freedom of flight. Spoiler alert. After the curse was broken, the hatchling had to search for a mate to continue his kind. The final book of the tale of the dragshi was told in Hatchling’s Vengeance. So each of the chronicles had something related to dragon. Hatchling was chosen as the keyword as at the time there were few titles with "hatchling" in them.

In each of the chronicles, a legend or tale from the past was recounted. When Hatchling's Vengeance was completed, there seemed to be something left unsaid. I knew it wasn't another book in the series. I realized that the legends needed their own due, which meant another book. One based in the world of the dragshi, but not of the tales of Branin and the trader girl Anastasia. After they legends were written (which ended up being a collection of five novellas and short stories. I didn't want a "dragon" or a "hatchling" title because I consciously wanted something different.

The anthology needed to have separation from the Dragshi Chronicles. A reread of the stories gave the answer. The one thing each had in common was first change-- the event when the dragon soul twin awoke. Hence the title selected was First Change: Legends From the Eyrie.

Do you like your titles to relate to the storyline or just be a catchy phrase? Leave a note in the comments below. And don't forget to visit the other authors who are participating in the 52-week 52-post challenge

~till next time, Helen

Me Bad. #MFRWauthor

No matter how much you write, whether it be blog posts, synopsis, or full-length novels, a hard lesson for many authors to accept is that their pearls of wisdom will not be perfect. We are human beings. Skilled ones, but still human beings. What can make writing a challenge is that we don't necessarily make the same mistakes every time. The word that got stuck in our head and appeared fifteen times in one chapter is replaced by another in the following one. A review of the first draft showed that we wrote the same dance scene twice in the book. Among the tools I use are style sheets, crib sheets and checklists to help identify problem words. Word processor spell check programs are useful, but I've often found them more frustrating as they insert words that I don't mean. The fall back is a dictionary and keen eye.

And now the list of things that have haunted and frustrated me in the past.

• Words stuck in your mind. Highlighting suspected ones and using a word frequency counter can help. The latest one to be used is from WriteWords. Although a beta reader with a keen eye is also useful.
• Dangling modifiers
• Affect vs effect
• Farther vs further

What is your bugaboo that you can't seem to avoid? Leave a comment. And be sure to click on the below links for more tips from the other authors in the hop.

~till next time, Helen

Bingeing on the Tube #MFRWauthor

Binge - to fulfill the same activity for hours or days.

Before I continue you should know that this is more of a wish list than a list of shows I've actually binge watched. I don't often have the luxury of watching a full television program let alone an entire season's worth.

Part of the criteria of the challenge is to write a meaningful post so I thought I'd give a little background into what went into the criteria. The main item was what I'll call the longevity factor. The storyline had to be varied enough to prevent boredom.

A good over-arching storyline could be intriguing for an episode or two before they got too repetitive. If each week the storyline consisted of stopping the bad guy, helping the girl, kissing her then walking away, and the major difference was they changed the model portraying the girl, it could get old fast.

Some programs had very little deviation in the problem. Others varied the circumstances a tad more, but fifteen minutes into the program you could tell what was going to happen when. There was no larger storyline such as ending a war. But the problem with some of those that did, when the larger problem was solved, the script-writers invented another one. Sometimes it worked, most often it didn't. Like a book series, they can get too formulaic and run past their natural ending.


So here's my list with a warning and a disclaimer. I write fantasy, science fiction, and historical fiction based in the American Old West so my tastes in television are similar.

Here's a few items I'd queue.  And a disclaimer: The list is composed from what is now called "on-the-air television" or "broadcast tv" so there might be more contemporary or popular ones such as Game of Thrones, Firefly, or The Librarians which don't appear on the list.


Science Fiction
Babylon Five 
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Battlestar Galactica
Time Tunnel

Westerns
Wild Wild West
Have Gun Will Travel 
Alias Smith and Jones
Magnificent Seven

Historical Action
Rat Patrol
12 O'clock High
Garrison's Gorillas

And for a change of pace -
The Red Skelton Hour
Hogan's Heroes
NCIS New Orleans
If you had unlimited time for a weekend or a week, what program would you watch? Would it be by episode or season? Leave your answer in the comments below and be sure to visit the other posts on the topic. The links are below.
 ~till next time, Helen

Suriving the Writing Life When You're Not the Author #MFRWauthor

This week's challenge prompt is "how my family survives my writing." It actually is a repeat of a topic we were challenged with in the beginning of last year. To devote more time to my NanoWriMo project I reviewed the earlier post and updated it. 

So "How Does my family survive my writing?"

Through my entire professional career both as a writer and all the other occupations/careers/jobs I've had over the years, I've always kept my personal and professional life separate. I was not one of those writers who had their spouse read their work or who co-wrote together. I think that was one of the secrets to my husband's surviving the world of books. We each had our own thing.

That doesn't mean that there was no interaction between our worlds. We both have an interest in history and outdoor activities so when those areas intersected with the writing life we both participated. Research trips to museums and military reenactments were an family trip, as were those to antique shows. the common interest in the outdoors was expressed with a sunset walk along the boardwalk. When photographs were needed, there were two bicycles on the local trails and he was always there to give a hand over a rough patch on the mountain hiking trail so that my camera wouldn't be damaged.

I write while he's reading his paper or out at a meeting or volunteering.


What's your secret to your family, whether it's a spouse or children, surviving your writing life? Leave a comment below.

And be sure to visit the other authors who are sharing their survival tactics.

~till next time, Helen

Out and About with Cynthia Woolf

The first interview of the year is up. I'm dishing secrets with Cynthia Woolf. You're invited to stop on by and see the answers to questions such as "Was your road to publication fraught with peril or a walk in the park?" and "advice for aspiring writers." There are also a couple of special questions answered just for my readers.

 Hope you'll stop on by and leave a comment. The post is at http://cynthiawoolf.com/?p=6732

~till next time, Helen

You Made a Resolution - Now to Keep It

Last week, the post was about resolutions. Following the focus of beginning the new year on a positive note, I thought I'd pass along an article by Fae Rowan which contains advice on how to keep your resolutions--especially if you resolved to write more, write better, or set certain goals for your writing career.

Fae lists seven key words. While they may or may not be familiar to you as a writer, you can say they are battle-tested. According to Fae, "These are the Seven Keys to Excellence that are the basis for Navy SEAL training."

I can hear your denials now. "I'm not a Seal," or "I don't jump out of a helicopter into the ocean." And my own, "I can't swim more than two strokes and I'm a couch potato, what do I need the keys to their training."

To learn the answer how seven words will help you meet your resolution,you have to go read the article at seven-tips-to-level-up-your-writing-career/. Fae explains how they fit into her writing life, and it sounded a lot like mine. And probably yours too.

One of the things that caught my interest was the similarity between Fae's bio and mine. Fae Rowen discovered the romance genre after years as a science fiction freak. Writing futuristics and medieval paranormals, she jokes that she can live anywhere but the present. As a mathematician, she knows life’s a lot more fun when you get to define your world and its rules.

My primary genre was fantasy (with some short science fiction stories sprinkled in.) Then a romance writer in my online critique group helped me develop that side of my writing and romance learned to take its rightful place alongside the fantasy. The comment about able to live elsewhere also resonated with me. Although my variant is that I get to hang out with mages and fly with dragons.

~till next time, Helen

Musings on The Forest Primeval

I love to hike in woods. And I'm not the only one to whom ancient stands of trees call to a special point in their soul.

On of my favorite places to sit and write is pictured. You can sit in the shade of the trees and watch the clouds drift over the lake. Between the hands of man and nature, the trees are not old, but even in a newer growth forest there is still a sense of serenity. However, travel a short distance and the scene steps back in time. You go from woods to a true forest, Climb high enough even go above the tree line to the world of scrubs and blueberry bushes.

If forests call to you or provide an intriguing setting, romance and fantasy author Mary Gillgannon's tale of searching for the forest primeval is worth a look, if only for the pictures. I particularly like the description of the bluebells.

Read the rest of the article at Muse...ings: The Forest Primeval. And be sure to check out her other travels and the books they've been featured in.

~till next time, Helen

I'm a Perfectionst... And I'm a Writer

Calling all perfectionists. Just because you're a writer doesn't mean you're doomed to fail or that you have to change yourself. Use it to your advantage.

For those who can't help finding the detail, a must-read  What Does It Mean To Be A Writer AND A Perfectionist?   by Colleen Story on the blog, Writers In The Storm.

Among the questions answered

• Why Do We Pick on Perfectionists?
• 5 Positive Traits of Perfectionist Writers
• 5 Challenges Facing Perfectionist Writers
• 7 Tips to Help You Become the Best Perfectionist Writer You Can Be

Read the full story at http://writersinthestormblog.com/2016/04/what-does-it-mean-to-be-a-writer-and-a-perfectionist. 

Colleen M. Story writes imaginative fiction and is also a freelance writer, instructor, and motivational speaker specializing in creativity, productivity, and personal wellness. Her latest novel, Loreena’s Gift, was released with Dzanc Books April 12 2016. Her fantasy novel, Rise of the Sidenah, is a North American Book Awards winner, and New Apple Book Awards Official Selection (Young Adult). She is the founder of Writing and Wellness, a motivational site for writers and other creatives. Find more at her website, or follow her on Twitter.

Guest Post by Emily Johnson

Today I welcome Emily Johnson as a guest to the Journey to the Stars blog who shares What Everyone Ought to Know about Workplace Organization

Workplace organization is a key to productivity boost, no matter where you work. A well-organized workplace can affect your productivity growth and, therefore, you can work faster.

Being inspired by OmniPapers manual about workplace organization, we've collected the best tips about this art.

Organize your workplace

A perfect workplace should have two zones: computer and non-computer ones. When you need to use your computer, go to the first zone. If you have some tasks to do away from your computer, go to the second zone. For example, you can call colleagues, read best practices, or take a break.

Clean up your writing place

Successful people claim that your writing place should be well-organized. Throw out drafts and notes you have or hide them into a locker. To keep all items you use daily, use boxes or drawers. Don't forget to put live plants (an aloe, a cactus, an azalea, etc.) to boost spirits and clean the air. If you feel tired, take a pause and drink a cup of green tea as it contains L-theanine that can improve brain functions.

Update gadgets

All workers have gadgets they use daily for business purposes. To stay productive, you need to update all gadgets you have. Plus, it is a good idea to use digital gadgets that might help you work efficiently. For example, buy a digital highlighter or a smart pen to translate and transfer texts to your computer.

Add comfort and health.

If you want to stay energetic, you need to take care of your health. While you're looking for a comfortable office chair, pay attention to the following: it should support the lower back and have arm rests. Plus, if you want to stay healthy, you need to use mini elliptical trainers while working, stand up from time to time, or work standing to reduce a risk of health diseases.

Your inspirational boosters

Every person has something that inspire him or her. It's very important to decorate your workplace with such boosters, so don't hesitate to put your favorite photo, a painting, or a quote to stay inspired while working.

There are many ways to boost productivity at work, and people should know all of them from A to Z. As soon as you start working efficiently, you'll start achieving more in your life.

After reviewing the infographic, click on it for more tips.





Thank you Emily for the interesting and informative tips. If you've enjoyed the post, click on the infographic for more tips.
 
About Emily: Emily Johnson is a writer and a content strategist of OmniPapers blog and contributor to many websites about blogging and writing. You can always find more works of hers on Twitter. 

~Till next time, Helen

I have a ...

When you're published (and having a signing event) it is inevitable that someone will approach you and the conversation starts with, "I've got a  (novel, novella, story, screenplay...) that I want to publish. How do I go about it?"

Depending on how serious the person is or the status of their work (or how many people are waiting to talk to you), the discussion can start with some basic decisions.

• Ebook  / print
• Indie Self-publishing /
• Small Houses / Big NYC firm

And I usually end with "Have fun with your writing."


Depending on their perceived skill level, I might mention what assistance is available from a given site such as createspace or kdp, but I usually stopped short of recommending any particular book. One reason is the great variance between authors in their writing ability, experience, and genre, not to mention the sheer number of books out there. 

Recently I gave a two-hour tutorial on bringing a book to life.The talk was given to a person with a completed manuscript and a determination to have a book in print. Their deadline was such that they needed something concise, complete, and easily understood. The book handed them was the 2015 edition of Createspace and Kindle Self-Publishing Masterclass: The Step-by-Step Author's Guide to Writing, Publishing and Marketing Your Books on Amazon by Rick Smith.

The result? The manuscript is now finished and undergoing editing. Pictures are being inserted, and the marketing/promotional plan being written. According to the soon-to-be published writer, Rich Smith's book provided the overview and sufficient detail to move the project along. Then they'll move onto more discrete resources such as the Smashwords guides, and help forums.

While not every book on craft, how-to-publish, and marketing is suitable for every author, whether published or wishing to be, the answer to I have a ... has been expanded to include Createspace and Kindle Self-Publishing Masterclass.

~Till next time, Helen

Find Createspace and Kindle Self-Publishing Masterclass on Amazon and more about Rick Smith's books at www.ricksmithbooks.com.