Blog Roundup: August 8 - 14, 2011

Roz Morris tweeted a link to this post from James Killick, which is pretty relevant to me right now since I'm in the formatting-for-publication stage of work with Cass Gets Her Kicks and am planning to take a couple of days off before I start the next project. I think I'll watch the third season of Supernatural and maybe even try to read Death Troopers.

There's a cute post over at A Chick Who Reads about what to do if the battery in your e-reader (specifically, NOOK) dies. I feel her pain. Sort of. Early on in my ownership of my Kindle, it crashed on me. I thought my life was over. All it needed was a hard reset.

Do Some Damage has an interesting post this week on spoilers. I avoid them when it comes to things I like. (I am still kind of bitter that the last Star Wars film was spoiled for me back in 2005.) The Internet and camera phones make it so easy for there to be a deluge of coverage now. I'd rather be surprised. Though, I won't lie, I'm considering reading Dexter spoilers, because watching last season episode-by-episode was hell on my blood pressure.

Erica Lucke Dean's post on growing up made me laugh. Growing up is so overrated. One can be a responsible adult and still enjoy animated films, iced animal cookies, chocolate milk, and coloring books. (Can you tell I'm still secretly five years old?)

Rik Davnall's post on passion vs. money in writing is worth reading. I would like to add that it might be difficult for writers who have written and shared their work online for free might also have a difficult time with the "charging money" aspect of publication, even self-publication. Personally, it has been odd to not immediately post Cass Gets Her Kicks in my usual channels. (By self-publishing, though, I know I have the potential to reach a much wider audience.)

As usual, Keystrokes & Word Counts comes through with more than one post worth reading. First up: on self-censoring. I think that certain opinions have the potential to lose you followers and fans (I doubt I'll make many friends with my unpopular dislike of certain books mentioned in a previous post) and maybe even make it difficult for you to be taken seriously. I think, though, that it really boils down to choosing your words and how you present yourself very, very carefully. I also really liked the post on the self-publisher's query. This is a huge problem in fanfiction and in amateur writing. "I'm not good at summaries" in the summary always irritates me. If you're not good at summaries, then I don't believe you're good at anything else, so I won't even bother. A well-written summary is key to hooking potential readers. I treat mine the same way I treat the body of work: it gets at least three rounds of editing.

Sirra once again collects her Twitter #writetips into a single blog post. Read them. They're worth the click.

Desirae posted about mood music. I've mentioned music in a previous post; the write piece of music can put me in the right mood to write a scene. Sometimes, a piece just needs a specific playlist. And sometimes, the right music has nothing at all to do with what you're writing, but the sound of it inspires your muse, who in turn can inspire you.

Paul Dorset posted about editing this week, which caught my attention because of where I was with Cass. I find it hard to believe that there are indie authors who do nothing more than run a spell check when they "edit," but, then, I also find it hard to believe that there are people who think that writing is a get-rich-quick scheme. I edit, revise, and rewrite until I'm sick of looking at my work and I'm sure it's as good as I can possibly make it. And even then, I'll probably give it at least one more read-through before I release it for public consumption.

Your Cover Uncovered has got to be my favorite "new" blog. This week's post reviewing Old Scores is so informative. I'm tempted to submit the cover for Cass, but I don't know if I'm that brave yet. I do know that I will continue checking her blog to make sure I don't commit a cover faux pas for as long as I'm designing my own.

This guest post from Smashwords founder Mark Coker is old, but it was new to me. I had no idea that Private Label Rights articles were being thrown together into shoddy ebooks and sold. It was kind of horrifying to read, though it was definitely informative.

I also read this article on the "new midlist" about self-published authors who earn a living. It was encouraging. Really encouraging. It was nice to see hard figures and to get a real idea of the kind of success I can strive for.