So…what did everybody think?
Bookshelf Battle
The only site where new bestsellers are forced to do battle for space on a nerd's bookshelf.
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Random Thoughts Part 2
Yes, noble readers, while most of you think normal thoughts, like, “I think I’d like to put some grape jelly on my toast today,” I, Bookshelf Q. Battler, am cursed to consider more bizarre machinations, such as:
11) Is it racist that Webster called his adopted mother, “Ma’am?”
12) Was The Facts of Life a 1980’s version of Little Women that left Louisa May Alcott rolling in her grave?
I lie awake at night thinking about this stuff. I really do. Stuff like:
13) Who put the bomp in the bomp bah bomp bah bomp? And is whoever put the ram in the rama lama ding dong still at large?
:::pounds my fist on the interrogation table and shines the hot light on the suspect::: “TELL ME! TELL ME RIGHT NOW WHAT I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE BOMP OR I’M GOING TO WALK TO THE NEXT ROOM AND MAKE A DEAL WITH YOUR BUDDY, THE DING DONG!””
14) Are timelines real? With every choice you make, no matter how big or small, do you make an infinite number of timelines, reflective of the outcomes of the various choices you could have made? If so, is there another me who actually puts book reviews on his book blog?
15) What is the meaning of life? Does it involve cheese?
16) In the highly-evolved world of Star Wars, why would anyone use a lightsaber, when laser pistols are so readily available? In our own less modern world, we stopped using swords once we developed bullets. In a world where laser guns are available, are people really going to use swords made out of light just because they look badass?
Yes. Yes they are.
17) Why don’t I sponsor one of those third world children they keep showing me on TV? They tell me I could change those kids’ lives for forty cents a day. I can spare forty cents a day. It’s not that I don’t have forty cents, it’s just that I’m too damn lazy to fill out the form, go to the website, make the call, or do whatever you have to do to sponsor one of these kids?
Sigh. Somewhere in a country ruled by a man with a tall hat and a uniform filled with self-awarded medals, there is a hungry kid whose malaria could be cured if I’d just get out of my own way long enough to figure out how to send it to him.
18) If I were to strap myself to a catapult, shoot myself through the stratosphere, into the cosmos, to the edge of the universe to the point where it all just loops around and I complete a perfect 360 degree journey back to where I started – would I be able to pick up right where I left off, or would there be another me there to contend with?
19) Why must we grow old? Why must we get ill and sick before we pass on? Why can’t we just stay youthful until we’re a hundred and then just fall asleep under a cherry tree?
20) A man begins a journey in Texas. He takes a plane to India, and said plane travels at a rate of 80 miles per hour. A woman begins her journey in Moscow, where she takes a train to Norway, said train traveling at a rate of 72 miles per hour. Given that the wind speed variables have been taken into consideration, that the Earth is in perfect alignment with Mars, and that neither party has a considerable advantage over the other…what will they eat for dinner?
Mindjammer – the Novel: sales numbers
Science Fiction Writer Sarah Newton, Author of Mindjammer, provides facts and figures of her book sales.
So, with the tax man never far away, I’ve been doing some sales reports this week to get a handle on how things have been going here at Mindjammer Central. One of the very pleasant surprises has been the sales figures for my far future transhuman science-fiction novel, Mindjammer, which I wrote back in 2011 and was published via Cubicle 7 Fiction and then via Mindjammer Press in 2012. In the two and a half years since publication, I found out today that we’ve actually sold a little over 3600 copies.
That actually blows me away. All but 230 of those were ebook sales. Of those 230 paperbacks, 160 of them were sold via Amazon Createspace – the other 70 were sold direct at conventions. The Createspace figure surprised me somewhat – although Amazon seem to be selling paperbacks at a more reasonable $12 or so these days.
Now…
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Blog posts – how often? Feedback welcome
This blogger wrote about me…why haven’t you? Why do you deny your audience the wit and wonder of Bookshelfbattle.com ?
Why should you read this blog? Are you reading it? What about my friends on Facebook, where I am republishing these posts?
I want your feedback. Even if it’s bad (see below).
I recently read a blog discussing the case for writing a post every day. The author decided to attempt this for the rest of 2015, even if this meant some pretty short posts (“I like waffles!”)
Robert Pimm at SALT Gallery in Istanbul, January 2015. Note rare shirt logo.
He has been as good as his word.
I, on the other hand, am torn. (Aside: my good friend Claudia Kennedy told me in Vienna in 1985 that the words “Keep coming up with love but it’s so slashed and torn”, sung in a raspy voice by David Bowie on the 1981 Queen and David Bowie version sent, to put it politely, a frisson down her spine. It’s at minute 2.16…
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I Like Waffles
I do. I really do.
God this is going to be a long year.
And to make it book related – I like to eat waffles and read books…at the same time?
Authors and Poets of the Harlem Renaissance
February is Black History Month, so I thought it might be nice to provide a sampling of works by authors and poets who were active during this movement.
There were so many, I won’t get to them all, but if I missed your favorite, let me know in the comments.
“But to look back from the stony plain along the road which led one to that place is not at all the same thing as walking on the road; the perspective to say the very least, changes only with the journey; only when the road has, all abruptly and treacherously, and with an absoluteness that permits no argument, turned or dropped or risen is one able to see all that one could not have seen from any other place.”
– James Baldwin, Go Tell It On The Mountain
I think he’s trying to say you never know how a choice in your life will turn out until you make it. What do you think?
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.– Langston Hughes, Dreams
That’s what this blog is all about.
“There is always a certain glamour about the idea of a nation rising up to crush an evil simply because it is wrong. Unfortunately, this can seldom be realized in real life; for the very existence of the evil usually argues a moral weakness in the very place where extraordinary moral strength is called for.”
– W.E.B. Dubois, The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America, 1638-1870
Pretty self-explanatory. Hard to stop an evil when enough evil existed for the evil to have been created in the first place.
“Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company? It’s beyond me.”
-Zora Neale Hurston
I thought this was a witty take on a serious subject.
“Authors do not supply imaginations, they expect their readers to have their own, and to use it.”
– Nella Larson, Author of Quicksand
OK, this quote has nothing to do with civil rights, but I came across it and had to share it, because I feel this way all the time. I mean, as an author, you do have to provide enough detail to establish who your character is, what he/she looks like, some major characteristics and traits, but after that – you have to leave it to the reader to fill in the blanks.
It’s hard when you think about it. I can picture my character in my head. If you read about my character, you’ll likely picture someone very different than who I had in mind. But overall, if the author has done his/her job, the reader will get the gist.
Best Websites for Writers
SA Mulroney provides a list of websites for writers, wanted to reblog it mainly so I remember to check them out. Has anyone checked out Grammar Girl? Her site is suggested to me often. I will have to check it out.
The Writer’s Digest 2015 Writer’s Yearbook provided a list of 101 best websites for writers (available only to subscribers or folks who sign up for their newsletter). What follows is my own personal top list of websites based on their selections, with a few additions of my own. In no particular order:
1. thestorystarter.com – This is just plain old writing fun. Need a writing spark? Head over to story starter and click the button. Sure, what you get might be nonsense, but it might also get your gears turning. You never know what will spark your next story idea or plot development.
2. Grammar Girl – I am not a grammarian. Most people… even writers aren’t, but it’s an important part of what we do. Have a grammar question? Like, “Is my participle dangling?” Head here. Grammar girl has the answers.
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Author Interview: Sean Platt, Self-Publishing Podcast
Reblog of Justin Sloan’s Author Interview with Self-Publishing Podcaster/Author Sean Platt
If you are anywhere in the self-publishing world or considering self-publishing, you should definitely know about Sean Platt. Sean and his buddies on the Self-Publishing Podcast were a large inspiration in my decision to self-publish, and their names cover the walls of Amazon like crayons cover my walls at home (I have a two year old at the time of writing). Sean Platt is the founder of the STERLING & STONE STORY STUDIO, creators of remarkable content for people who relish the art of storytelling.
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Does my selfpublished book need an ISBN?
The question of ISBNs in self-publishing comes up a bit. Traditionalists are adamant that an ISBN is ?essential? and that it make you look ?professional?.
I have to admit to being a bit allergic to that latter word: ?professional?. It?s a word that?s making a beeline for my list of hated words, because it?s so often used to put down ?people who disagree with me?.
In the 1990?s in the heydays of my non-fiction bookselling, I dealt with a publishing company in Germany. They had about 40-odd books out and made a living from this. None of their books had ISBNs. To me, it was a small pain in the arse, because I listed their books on websites that liked to get ISBNs and that put their books in the dungeon of the pre-1960s books that did not have ISBNs. Bookshops need ISBNs to enter books in their system, and…
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Jeff Bezos and Amazon: Making Authors Dreams Come True
I enjoyed this post by Children’s Author Sue Shanahan so much that I wanted to reblog it.
It’s become popular these days to badmouth Amazon, but I happen to love Amazon and their CEO, Jeff Bezos, in particular. They are what made it possible for me, a 59-year-old author/illustrator, to share her books with the world. After my children’s picture book apps found an audience, I longed to see them in print. I submitted them to countless publishers and agents and most times never even received a rejection letter. Self-publishing was the only avenue left to get my stories into kids’ hands. Upon discovering the astronomical costs of that, my dream seemed doomed.
Choose yourself! ―James Altucher
I thought having my apps made into books was hopeless until I heard an interview with author Hugh Howey. I learned that after being unable to find a publisher, he self-published his best seller, Wool, through Amazon. He explained that Amazon has partnered with print-on-demand company, CreateSpace…
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