Showing posts with label Kindle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kindle. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 18, 2020

How Do You Know If You've Written A Classic Part 4 - Fifty Year Test

How Do You Know If You've Written A Classic
Part 4
Fifty Year Test

Previous parts in "How do you know if you've written a classic?" series are:

Part 1 in this Series is about writing a "classic" illustrating the long time fan discovering new entries in a series.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/02/how-do-you-know-if-youve-written.html

Part 2, Spock's Katra, is a long answer to a request for material for an online blog.  My answer focused on Theodore Bikel and his roles in Star Trek.

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/10/how-do-you-know-if-youve-written.html

Part 3 answers very insightful interview questions from a Podcast host.  The verbal podcast interview is very different, but here are answers done with some time to think of how to explain the invisible connections between Star Trek, my deep study of the fan dynamics of the TV Series, and my own original universe Sime~Gen novels.

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2019/07/how-do-you-know-if-youve-written.html
Now in Part 4 we look at an OLD historical mainstream novel (written in the mid 1960's) - not a Romance Genre item which leaves you room to shift genres and make a truly original contribution to the field.  Study its marketing and now re-marketing as an ebook (I picked it up on Kindle, free, when advertised on BookBub).

Romance Genre needs marketing like this.  There are plenty of Historical novels as good, and even more that are just plain better, set in the 1800's, that should be promoted like this.

https://www.amazon.com/Tai-Pan-Epic-Novel-Founding-Asian-ebook/dp/B07HB94TBJ/


This novel is about the founding of Hong Kong.  In 2018, Hong Kong exploded into the news with "protests" and marches against being "ruled" by China.  China is in the news with "trade negotiations" -- and intellectual property theft (a crime that didn't exist when Hong Kong was founded).

The THEMATIC issues that a Romance writer can lift from Clavell's "Asian Saga" will seem as if they were ripped from the headlines of the 2020's.

Clavell played up the sex and violence.  If you re-set this entire "founding of" and the rise of an international mogul into the coming Space Age where nations fight for trade among the planets and asteroids with a focus on Romance, in 50 years, you might see your themes repeating in the headlines.  Clavell didn't live long enough, but did see the sure success of a classic.

I am seeing his "style" of writing emerging in the science fiction field, so blend Romance into the mix, study the style, create a new genre if you add dimensions of Soul Mates to politics and the forces that move human history.  Don't forget to include E. E. Smith's Lensman Series premise and themes. 

Yes, humanity never learns, or maybe new souls have to take the same courses of instruction in the school of hard knocks, but that stubborn, dense-headed element of humanity is what you can exploit to create a Classic Romance of the magnitude that Clavell has reached.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Thursday, December 28, 2017

New Year's Goals

In January, I prefer to set "goals" (modest, achievable ones) rather than "resolutions." The latter word sounds more intimidating (and yet fragile). Assuming the annual "Sword and Sorceress" anthology appears again in 2018, I plan to submit a story to it, as usual. Also, my husband and I will work together to come up with a submission for the next Darkover anthology. We had collaborative works in the 2016 and 2017 volumes but didn't make it into the one forthcoming in May 2018, so there's a challenge for us.

Writers Exchange E-Publishing is gradually re-releasing my former Amber Quill books. (By my count, there are eight more to go.) I've written a next-generation sequel to one of those, which I'll submit to Writers Exchange sometime soon. Since they don't publish erotic romance, one of my 2018 goals will be to compile e-books of my erotic romances from my other defunct publisher, Ellora's Cave, toning them down a little from heavily graphic to steamy. I've already released two self-published Kindle steamy romance books. ARDENT BLOOD (originally published by Amber Quill) comprises three novellas, featuring werewolves, vampires, and a lonely undine:

Ardent Blood

DEMON'S FALL (originally included in a multi-author Ellora's Cave anthology) stars a fallen angel who defies his infernal lords to save a woman he's been assigned to tempt. I think of it as inspirational erotic paranormal romance, if such a genre crossing can exist:

Demon's Fall

My next steamy romance bundle will probably contain my three related vampire novellas from Ellora's Cave, because it's important to me to have all my "Vanishing Breed" vampire tales available for purchase. I've combined two linked stories in that universe from the fanzine GOOD GUYS WEAR FANGS 4 into a short e-book, VAMPIRE'S TRIBUTE:

Vampire's Tribute

I'm also putting together a collection of stories my husband and I had in the discontinued fantasy webzine SORCEROUS SIGNALS.

Other than short stories for submission to the "Sword and Sorceress" and Darkover anthologies, I don't have any new works planned for the near future. I do have a light paranormal romance novella out on submission and hope to find a home for it in the coming year. What are your writing goals for 2018?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Tuesday, September 08, 2015

Tarot Just For (Romance) Writers Now On Kindle by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Tarot Just For (Romance) Writers Now On Kindle
 by
 Jacqueline Lichtenberg



This month is seeing the Kindle-only release of a compilation and substantial revision of the 20 blog posts so popular on this blog about how to use Tarot in writing Romance genre, and all its spinoffs.

Below you will find links to the Amazon pages where these 5 volumes and the compilation of all 5 in one volume are available.

Here is some of the story behind these new releases of non-fiction books started in 1996, volumes that contain thinking dating to back 1972.

While we're waiting on release of the Sime~Gen Anthology, FEAR AND COURAGE, with stories by 14 new Sime~Gen contributors (beyond Jean Lorrah and me) and while we're waiting on completion of the Sime~Gen Concordance, I've crammed another project into this time-slot.

That project is the series of volumes on the Tarot that was originally contracted to Belfry Books in 1997.  The first volume was published as The Biblical Tarot: Never Cross A Palm With Silver.

My original series title, now in use on Kindle exclusive editions is The Not So Minor Arcana.

Look at the end of this post for links to pre-order of the volumes on Kindle, or if you're reading this after September 2015, you can download them immediately.

Right after publication of NEVER CROSS A PALM WITH SILVER, Belfry Books went out of business due to the collapse of the Book Distribution business before the next 2 volumes, Wands and Cups, could be published.

I had written the volumes on Wands and Cups, working against the established deadline in the contract, and was ready to deliver them when Belfry Books announced they were out of business.

I retrieved my rights and set the project aside until, in 2006,  Rowena Cherry​ asked me to join this Alien Romance co-blog she had just started.

I'd never blogged, was just barely thinking about doing that, and so of course I said yes!  I love to do new things!

So when I hit on the idea of finishing the set of Tarot Books with a blog post per chapter, I didn't expect anyone to read it.  It's dense, abstract, off-topic, meta-thinking of little interest to anyone.

The blog was about Alien Romance Novels, Science Fiction Romance sub-genre, Paranormal and Futuristic Romance readers, but I wrote specifically for the writers, not the readers, of Romance.
The first two volumes, Wands and Cups, are very abstract, theoretical, written for the Intermediate Tarot student.

The second two, written for this blog on Romance is aimed at the advanced student of Romance Writing looking to add Fantasy and/or Science Fiction elements.  Tarot provides a worldbuilding template that all readers understand without having it explained to them, thus cutting out the deadly Expository Lump.

Here are links to the 10 posts on Swords and the 10 posts on Pentacles.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/03/pausing-for-you-to-catch-up-with-me_23.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/03/pausing-for-you-to-catch-up-with-me_23.html

The Kindle versions on Amazon are re-edited and expanded, substantially revised.

This is difficult material to place with a publisher because my take on Tarot is the opposite of what the market for such books wants.  My thesis is that Tarot is of no use whatsoever for "foretelling" the future.  It won't give you magical power, or any other competitive edge of any kind.

The Volumes are very short, about 30,000 words, too short to publish as a stand alone paper book, and they contradict common beliefs on every page.

In other words, these 5 volumes are of use to science fiction romance writers, fantasy writers, creators and purveyors of imaginary fun.  It's a how-to manual on fiction writing, and a non-fiction presentation of how I created and wrote Sime~Gen and most all my other novels.

These volumes contain the world-building I did as I created Sime~Gen, and some of the other universes, like Molt Brother and City of a Million Legends as well as the Dushau Trilogy (remember Dushau won the first Romantic Times Award for Science Fiction - so long ago, the award is not listed in the online compilation though I still have the little statue), Dushau, Farfetch, Outreach.

Oh, yes, and my Vampire novels Those of My Blood and Dreamspy.  Especially, Dreamspy.  Are based in the paradigm I extracted from Tarot.

These non-fiction books contain what is behind that which is behind the underpinnings behind my worldbuilding.  This behind-behind structure, 4-layers deep at least, is why you can't read the novels and spot the mechanism that generated them.

Because these volumes on Tarot are so short, they could not be released economically through a publisher such as Wildside, which does not have any New Age imprint.

The complete, compiled 5 books together are too big to be released as one, certainly not in a print version.

Compile the 5 volumes into 1, then cut that 1 in half, and any abstract meaning someone might glean would be lost.  The 5 volumes are in fact a single structure, built to a point.

Kindle comes to the rescue with their somewhat new arrangement allowing authors to release titles for 99 cents.  And that's about what these little volumes are worth to readers.  Released through a publisher, they would be $4.50 or so apiece, minimum, which is way too much for what you get.

As we have been working on the Sime~Gen titles and then the video game for several years, I have had no time to take Karen L. MacLeod​ 's edited version of the Tarot books and reformat it for Kindle posting (no small feat; a bizarre process indeed!)

After we sent in to Wildside Press Sime~Gen Vol. 13 (Fear And Courage), and while Zoe Farris​ was polishing up the Concordance Manuscript for me to prepare to send to Wildside, I put the Tarot books together in Kindle format.

Now 6 volumes in The Not So Minor Arcana Series are coming available throughout September 2015.  You can order or pre-order.  If you pre-order, Amazon will deliver the books to your Kindle or whatever device you have chosen for your Kindle books.

There are 5 small, separate volumes, plus one huge all-5-volumes together (which is over a meg of download).  If download size is an issue for you, choose the individual books.

I'd like to know if these books turn up being pitched to you by Amazon.

I hope to make these available free for a time toward the end of the year but I don't know when or if I'll have time to do that.

You can pre-order or order at these web-pages now.

The combined volume is cheaper for you than buying each separately.

The Not So Minor Arcana: Never Cross A Palm With Silver Aug 30, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0108MC26O

The Not So Minor Arcana: Wands Sept. 1, 2015  99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVPKU

The Not So Minor Arcana: Cups Sept. 11, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106SATX8

The Not So Minor Arcana: Swords  Sept. 17, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0100RSPM2

The Not So Minor Arcana: Pentacles  Sept. 21, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVKF0

The Not So Minor Arcana: Books 1-5 combined Sept. 24, 2015 $3.25
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010E4WAOU

These books can all be "borrowed" on the Amazon Unlimited program for free, as can Dushau, Farfetch and Outreach.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Targeting a Readership Part 5: Where is everybody?

Targeting a Readership Part 4 is:
 http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/06/targeting-readership-part-4.html

Ran across a WIRED article that brought together a whole lot of observations about drawing a bead on your reader -- seeing the world they way your reader does and so knowing what that reader will find "entertaining" enough to memorize your byline.  Here's the article:

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/06/best-gear-for-cutting-cable-cords/

People are increasingly abandoning cable subscriptions, hooking their new flatscreens directly to the internet via their home network (usually from a cable or satellite provider) and watching movies.

In June, I cruised ABC, NBC, SYFY, USA, FOX and a couple others I watch a lot using my cable provider's listings.  I went across the grid for an entire week, and found only 3 series shows I watch coming on again.

I'd heard other series will appear later in the summer, (and they have) but in June I found lots and lots of basically empty airtime, "paid programming" slots, a great deal of news commentary repeats, some really old movies I've seen a number of times, and only a couple of series that I'm not interested in watching.  I cruised maybe 20 or so of the over 900 channels on my cable. 

What I deduce from this is that the networks lack money.

I've picked up a few mentions, which I have not verified, that the total audience at the broadcast networks has dropped again this last year, that cable is picking up audience, but the total-audience size for cable shows is miniscule compared to the 330 million population of the USA.

I've noticed more than just the massively skewed "slant" of the TV News (both broadcast and cable).  They are using the euphemism "24-hour-news-cycle" to refer to what is essentially a news blackout.

Each successive news show throughout the day on all the channels (I comparison shop news) is covering just about the same 5 "top stories" -- over and over and OVER. 

This really means that no reporters or crews are covering anything else, which means they have fewer reporters, and the reason for that is fewer viewers. 

But when I use my Kindle Fire (or iPod or iPhone etc) to access an app called PULSE which lets you subscribe to newsfeeds it selects (you look on a list and populate your pages with feeds you want -- magazines, newspapers, TV channels with video, blogs, and their own distillation of news stories)  I find almost the same 5 top stories pushing all the rest of the Events of the day out of public awareness.

Many pundits hold that the "general public" doesn't want more than 5 stories, no more than 3 minutes apiece, for their "news" for the day.  No attention span, no intelligence, whatever the reputed cause, "people don't want it."

Well.... maybe that's true from a commercial news distribution point of view, but there's a vicious circle there.

When the news "narrative" becomes boring, people tune out, audience drops, advertisers pay less for ad spots, available funds to pay reporters to go search-out-and-report stories drops, the narrative becomes thinner, the audience drifts off bored, ad rates go down again.

The news, like fiction, like pitches for novels, has to be entertaining, gosh-wow, eye-popping, "I gotta tell Nancy about THIS!" viral, so the news editors search for something to put up there that will hold audience attention over the commercials.

I've also noted that the amount of air-time on TV news spent on commercials is now equal to or greater than the amount of time on the "segments" with content. 

That's a symptom of the shrinking audience.  Advertisers pay less, so the show needs more of them to pay the bills.  To reduce costs, they put on fewer "content" minutes and to raise revenue they put on more ads, which drives more audience to click off. 

This is happening on news and on TV fiction Series, too. 

Audience is spending time elsewhere, and nothing these content providers can do is getting that audience back.

According to publishers, the number of copies of a given title (unless you're talking a "tell-all" expose non-fiction best-seller) being sold is going down, copies-sold is shifting to e-book, and to make up operating expenses they are (as publishers always do in recessions) publishing more titles with less advertising for them.

It's the same economics that drives TV cable or broadcast -- audience size.

Now we have games, Facebook and its online games, Netflix and Amazon etc etc delivering movies via the internet, so that even though we have more people ( 330 million vs 65 million in the 1950's heyday of radio when TV was stealing audience-share), we have fewer people per product.

This is the market that new writers are trying to sell fiction into.

I've discussed the multitude of pressures on the storyteller's business model in previous posts here, and no doubt will rave on and on about this because the shifts and changes veer in different directions each year.

2012 is the year of CROWD SOURCING -- YouTube videos are made professionally now, paying actors, camera, stunts, editing etc and making money by getting "hits" on pages with ads, like blogs do.

I saw an interview with "The Obama Girl" who made that YouTube Video making sexy about Obama for the 2008 election.  She was paid to do that video, and though she won't publicly repudiate Obama (thinking he's done a good job) she's not supporting him either.  Her career has taken off, she's making films, and she's living in Los Angeles.   She had made dozens of other videos before that one "went viral" and made her career.  It's a new business model.

I've also seen a number of web-based video fiction projects -- soap opera like installments in various genres, short films, all kinds of fiction-based things. 

On Twitter, I regularly see crowd-sourcing for funds to make films, short and feature-length. 

This is just like self-publishing except it's an entire Group of people doing a project together. 

Writers now face this distracted, divided, segmented, diffuse market for fiction.  There is no single model for "success" (i.e. making a living at writing). 

There is no single proven solution to this problem, but I do believe that such solutions are forming in the electronic era. 

I have not found "where everyone went" yet - and I'm beginning to think "everyone" didn't go "anywhere.'

I think they headed for the hills and scattered. 

What could possibly call them back?  What could gather enough attention to fund something huge, comprehensive, pervasive, and accurately fact-checked as CNN was a couple years after it first started?

I don't know, but recently a friend on twitter pointed out to me a facility on Kindle that I'm not at all sure about, but that holds some promise.

When you read a Kindle book and make notes, you can go on Amazon and turn on a feature that lets your "notes" that you make (like marginal notes when you read a printed book) be read by your friends from various social networks.

The access controls don't seem very fine-tuned to me, but Amazon is testing all kinds of social-interaction communications channels among  consumers of various kinds of products including fiction.

I was reading a Kindle novel titled 'SCUSE ME WHILE I KILL THIS GUY by Leslie Langtry which I think I will review (it's funny and good!) and clicked on the dialog bubble at the bottom of the screen and found a large number of notes by other people. 

And my hair stood on end!  THIS COULD BE WHERE EVERYONE WENT! 

I wonder if Apple has anything like this. 

It's a kind of "book club" reading experience where you share thoughts on a subject while you're reading about it.  But it kind of creeps me out. 

I definitely know that "people" aren't where I am (watching TV), they aren't where I was, they ARE here among the "share notes" feature on Amazon Kindle, and now that I watch a lot on Amazon Streaming and other such services, I might be able to find everybody.

If you see me pass by, flag me down! 

For more theories on where everyone went see the blog entry here on August 7, 2012. 

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com


Tuesday, September 08, 2009

Enter to win a free Kindle from Dorchester

Given that the deadline before which all entries must be received is 9/11, I hope that Linnea Sinclair and Jacqueline Lichtenberg will forgive me for posting out of turn.

http://dorchesterpub.com/Dorch/SpecialFeatures.cfm?ID=2719

This drawing is in connection with Dragoncon.