eBook Cover
Greeting readers.
I have decided to release my first two novels in the New Druids series as one combined volume. I am calling it “Leaf and Branch”. I will have it out for purchase within the week. Until then please have a look at my cover design and let me know what you think. I have deviated from my normal covers in order to make it stand out a little more.
Ciao!
Paperback Cover
Are the major publishing houses dying a slow painful death? The following is an outstanding article written on the blog site of one of my favourite authors, Hugh C. Howey. He wrote an amazing series of novels of a dystopian world that I highly recommend. Here is the link to the first in the Silo series: Wool.
Why is he one of my favourites? It’s because he started as a self-publishing author and put a short story up for sale on Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. It became the Wool Omnibus and led to his other great novels. So for me, as a self-published author, he is someone to be admired. He wrote the article below on his blog site and I hope it’s okay to publish this on my own blog. I’m going to contact him and let him know. He might get mad at me. Hope not.
Anyway, I digress. The traditional publishing community is in a very real danger of collapsing down to something unrecognisable from today. Have a read and comment on what you think. I also encourage you to check out Hugh’s blog – it’s fun: http://www.hughhowey.com/blog/
I am doing a Black Friday sale with my two novels on Amazon.com. Yes, that is correct: the New Druids series will be on sale!
The first novel, Duilleog will be FREE starting November 22nd straight through to Saturday, November 26, 2016. Yes, free. My GeBA Gold award winning novel will be FREE for five days!
The second novel, Craobh will be on countdown starting at $0.99 USD and going up a dollar every couple of days – so get it early. This is my GeBA nominated novel, folks!
This is my first time doing this – hope it interests you!
Ciao!
Hugo Awards Logo
Books vary in length. There are many factors such as the font, the size of the font, page size, etc. Typically we assume an average page contains 350 words. Then you have to ask yourself what is the “normal” length for a fantasy novel? Well, I have an answer that most people should accept seeing as it comes from a very good fantasy source.
The Hugo Awards state for their award categories they use the following word count:
So, 40,000 words for a novel. Most novels I read, such as urban fantasy, are around 70,000 to 90,000 words. Takes me around 6 hours to read. My last novel was 135,000 words. So wow, poop on a stick! I should be splitting my novels into their two parts and selling them that way! I would have FOUR books on the market by now!
Just kidding. I just write a lot of – very meaningful – words. I’ve always been verbose. I spend time describing the world that most best-selling authors don’t do. Lots and lots of dialogue interspaced with a little tell. That’s the big drive for acceptable mainstream novels these days. Writers always preach “Show don’t tell“. At its simplest, this phrase means to show the reader what is happening, or what the character is feeling by showing it, not telling. For example, you don’t write “He felt sad.” Instead, you would show it. For example: “The man hung his head and lifted a finger to wipe away a stray tear.” You’ve just shown he is sad instead of saying that he is sad. I admit it is a much better way of writing and lets the writer show his/her talent. That being said, it’s reached the point that if you don’t show and do tell, people will harshly critique you. I think it’s a step backwards in some ways. I love the tell that the classic fantasy authors provided – and don’t tell me they didn’t. Pun intended.
So why blog all this dribble? I have decided that after Freamhaigh, the fourth novel in the New Druids series, I will reduce the words in my next novels down to around 80,000 to 90,000 words. And publish more often. The New Druid series will embark on a series of smaller tales after Freamhaigh. Many ideas. Just need the time to write them.
Ciao!
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