Better Late Than Never

I loaned a copy of A/G to my boss and was delighted by his reaction (he was prodding me to do a sequel and called it "absolutely amazing" :) But I was a little embarrassed when he asked me how to pronounce Aigaion and I couldn't really answer him. The working title for the book, at the very beginning, was just Apple, and when I came up with the actual title, I was going more for what it looked like (obviously) than how it sounded. Anyway, I made it my mission upon getting into work today to find out once and for all. With some help from the software and a pronunciation guide for the greek alphabet, I figured it out. As I`ve long-suspected (I tried to figure this out with my greek text books as well, but I could never work out if the transliteration was from modern or ancient Greek), Aigaion is pronounced eye-guy-on. So there you go. You can stop wondering now ;)

A Review

So, by now, you're probably well aware who Alison Strobel is (she's the author of The Weight of Shadows, which I reviewed on here, as well as several other novels). Alison recently reviewed my book and gave me the most flattering review I could hope for. She actually compared me to Terry Pratchett, which has to be one of the nicest things anyone has ever said about my writing. You can read the review here.

Speaking of Chuck Wendig...

Well, we weren't, but I was poking around on his blog to day (it's awesome...I'm putting it in the links to the left because he's hilarious and brilliant and a free-lance writer and a figure worth learning from)...

Anyway, he's doing a Flash Fiction thing. Details HERE, but basically, he wants 1000 or less words of vacation-oriented horror stories...by which I mean, monsters and shite, not "my plane was THREE HOURS LATE and all I had to eat was these horrible peanuts and then the kid next to me wee'd himself and rolled in it". Whole other genre, that.

I figured it was right up our collective alley. We should all do it. He wants them by the 11th of Feb-October.

Best part: He's going to put them on his blog, as is, which means (you guessed it): Exposure! Fame! Fortune! Someone in "The Business" might read it!

Also, prizes may be involved. But, apparently, us Canucks will have to pay the shipping if we win.

I've found another article that everyone might find interesting. This one's about an apparently pretty strong gender bias in the publishing world when it comes to book covers.


I Write A Nasty Book. And They Want A Girly Cover On It.

Discuss!

>:D

Freelance Writing

Godchecker put the link to this article up on their twitter account. I read it, and thought, "Everyone at DevCo would love this", and (even though Bean's already got Godchecker on her twitter follow list thingy), I figured I'd at least let E have a go. >:D

Really though; it's a good article about freelance writing and why you can get away without pants it's awesome

Why You Should Freelance (Despite All That Face-Punching Business)

Good discussion question from this: would you ever consider doing full time freelance writing, or would you rather have a specific publication/publisher?

A Quick Thought About Marketing and Day Jobs

I'm amazed that day job wasn't already a tag, given the nature of DevCo and the nature of writing today (as in, skill and perseverance pretty much have to be combined with unbelievable luck in order to get far ahead enough to no longer require a day job), but there you have it. I'm at mine right now.

I came up with a great marketing idea, or at least an OK marketing idea, involving Twitter (I know :p). I thought I would post something every day (maybe first thing in the morning) telling people the best rate for Aigaion Girl and where they can find it. Eventually, the constant posts have to get someone's attention, right?

So that's my thought. How it pertains to my day job: I don't have a computer of my own, so I have to use the one at work - and that one won't let me use Twitter; it has some antiquated net nanny thing on it which I could probably disable really easily, but am not going to because I like my day job bosses.

OK, I think that's it for me. I'd put up a picture of Marco, but the only one I have is at home.

A Thought...

We've talked before about the idea of a DevCo anthology. This idea came to me last night as I was trying to get to sleep. I'm not sure how feasible it is, but I like the concept, and I wanted to know what you guys thought about it.

Years ago, I wrote a story about a vampire who accidentally acquires a human child and is forced to look after her*. Right now, the story is 60 pages, and even once I've rewritten it, I anticipate it will be significantly fewer than 100. So... I want to put it in an anthology... but I don't know if I want an anthology of just my stuff this early in my career. I think I'd rather do something more varied, with really strong pieces from other talented writers (hint, hint).

I would like to put something together with a few interlocking themes. So far, what I've come up with for themes is: vampires, werewolves, masks and dark fairytales. There are a couple of stories you guys have written that I think would be perfect.

My plan would be to self-publish, and to donate all the proceeds to a charity. I'm thinking, since blood factors into most of the themes, a charity that supports resarch into a blood disease or the blood bank or something like that. I'd like to have it ready for release in September of 2012, in time to be purchased online for the Xmas season.

I'm happy to do all the design and layout stuff, and if everyone's game, we could do a mass group-edit.

Anyway, what do you guys think? It was kind of a spur-of-the-moment random idea, so I just wanted to get a feel for your reactions.

*It sounds like the making of a bad Disney comedy, I know, but it's not terribly funny and the parts of it that are are quite dark.