Work in Progress: Blood Trade

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My next book will be Blood Trade.  It’s coming along nicely, despite my only being able to work on it after school– on weekends I’m too tired.  As soon as summer starts, I’ll finish the first draft.  I’m considering several professional editors for it, now that I’m making enough in royalties to actually afford one.

Blood Trade began as my take on a vampire story, but now that I’m in it, while it is chock-a-bock full of vampires (and werewolves), they are relatively incidental to the real story.  My three main characters, the good, the bad, and the ugly are all human beings.  This will also probably be my first story that carries and “Adult Only” warning.  It’s very, very dark and very, very violent.  Of course nobody seems to give a crap about that.  There’s also sex, violent sex, and rape which (at least here in America) freaks everyone out.  Hence the warning.

I am just finishing chapter five of thirteen chapters that I’ve plotted out.  When I’m actually finished with the draft, I may be down to twelve.  That often happens with me.  That will be about 52,000 words.  Tomorrow, I’ll give you a little bit about the story.

His Robot Girlfriend: 5 Star Review

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5.0 out of 5 stars Fun and interesting, May 1, 2011

By N. M. Legel “Author of Deadly Vanity” (Phoenix, AZ) – See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) This review is from: His Robot Girlfriend (Perfect Paperback)

This short story is a fun read and I, personally, love that the author took inflation and commercialism into account when building his vision of America in the not-so-distant future. There are a few conflicts going on in this story that I would love to have seen developed further, but that is to be expected in a story this length that is trying to cover as complex a concept as falling in love with a robot. I can definitely say that this story is worth the little money it costs and I have since purchased the sequel to this story and I am looking forward to reading it.

End of the Shuttle Program

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This week marks the end of the Space Shuttle program.  It may well mark the end of America’s manned exploration of space.  Though I know the vast majority of American’s won’t even mark the passing, I will.  To my mind, this was the greatest endeavor and greatest achievement in human history– greater than the pyramids, the Great Wall, the transcontinental railroad.  Yes, we may send astronauts into space, hitchhiking or taking the equivalent of an interplanetary taxi-cab, but the great enterprise is gone.

Five Star Review for His Robot Wife

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Review by: Andreas Friedle on May. 11, 2011 :

I really enjoyed this book (But I think “My Robot Girlfriend” was a little bit better). It was short, but a very good read. For 1 dollar… excellent!
When there’s part 3 or something similar coming: I’ll read it.

Currently Reading: A World of Difference

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A World of Difference

It’s been a while since I posted a “Currently Reading.”  I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had time to read much.  A world of difference is a stand-alone science fiction novel by the master of alternate history: Harry Turtledove. 

Product Description

http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=citofama-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0345360761&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr

Characters: Norar Remontar

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Since Princess of Amathar is very much an homage to A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, it’s no surprise that the warrior alien is very much inspired by Tars Tarkas.  Norar Remontar is a proud knight of the city of Amathar and befriends Alexander rather grudgingly.  But once befriended, he is true till the end.  I created the Amatharian names with an idea that they would be very difficult to say aloud– I’m not really sure why.

Characters: Senta Bly

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The funny thing about Senta is that I never intended to write a book about her, let alone make her the main character in a series.  I originally wrote a description from her viewpoint that was supposed to showcase the setting of Brech City.  When I eventually plotted out the trilogy that would become books 1, 3, and 5 of the Senta and the Steel Dragon Series, she took on more and more importance.  When I added books 0, 2, and 4 to the mix, the entire story really became her story.

I’m looking forward to completing the series this summer and am already thinking about another six book series that features Senta later in life.  I won’t get started on that until at least next year, but I’m already feeling the bug to write it.

Senta is precocious and self-confident.  As she grows up she learns more and more magic and discovers that she is a powerful sorceress.  One of the most fun things about writing this series is that the characters are so inter-connected.  Senta has relationships of one sort or another with more than a hundred major and minor characters.  Hopefully this diversity makes her as much fun to read about as she is to write about.

Characters: Alexander Ashton

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I thought I would spend some time talking about my characters over the coming weeks.  My first character was Alexander Ashton.  It’s been so long ago, I don’t remember where his first name actually came from, but I think it was probably from Alexander the Great.  His last name was from a young lady I used to work with, who was one of my first beta readers.

Alexander is a hero in the vein of John Carter and other Edgar Rice Burroughs heroes.  He is strong and rediculously formidable in battle, and also very intelligent, but make the occassional rediculous mistake or assumption that leads to him into danger.  He is very fun to write, and Princess of Amathar is from his first person viewpoint.  Although he frequently expresses doubt about himself, one gets the impression that he seldom really doubts.

When I eventually get the sequel done (the working title is Knights of Amathar) Alexander Ashton will once again tell the story.

Featured Ebook: Smashwords Style Guide

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The Smashwords Style Guide has helped thousands of authors produce and publish high-quality ebooks. This free guide offers simple step-by-step instructions to create and format an ebook. It’s required reading for any author who wants to distribute their book via Smashwords to major ebook retailers such as the Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo and Diesel.

Download it Free Now: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/52#longdescr
INSIDE THE SMASHWORDS STYLE GUIDE

GETTING STARTED
Welcome to Smashwords!
Do-it-yourself, or hire help?
Good formatting examples
What Smashwords publishes, what we don’t publish
Five common formatting mistakes to avoid
How Smashwords publishes books
How Smashwords distributes books
How ebook formatting is different from print formatting
How we convert your book into multiple ebook formats
The three secrets to ebook formatting
How to avoid (and fix) AutoVetter errors
Introduction to Meatgrinder conversion system
Your required source file
Understanding the different ebook formats

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
FORMATTING
Pre-Prep
Making Word Behave
Step 1: Make a back up
Step 2: Activate Word’s Show/Hide
Step 3: Turn off Word’s “AutoCorrect” and “AutoFormat” features
Step 4: Eliminate text boxes
Step 5: The Nuclear Method

Formatting
Step 6: Unify Manuscript around Normal paragraph style
Step 7: Managing and modifying paragraph styles, fonts
Step 7a. How to choose the best paragraph separation method (first line indent or block?)
Step 7b: How to implement your chosen paragraph separation method
Step 7b-a: How to define a proper first line indent
Step 7b-b: How to define trailing “after” space for block paragraphs
Step 7b-c: Special tips for poetry, cookbooks and learning materials
Step 7b-d: How to define proper line spacing
Step 8: Check your normalized text
Step 9: Why you should never use tabs or the space bar for indents
Step 10: Managing paragraph returns
Step 11: Managing hyperlinks
Step 12: Designating chapter breaks, page breaks, section breaks
Step 13: Working with images
Step 14: Text justification
Step 14a: Centering text
Step 15: Managing font sizes
Step 16: Style formatting, symbols and glyphs
Step 17: Headers and footers
Step 18: Margins, page sizes and indents
Step 19: Add the Heading style to your Chapter headers (optional)
Step 20: Building navigation into the manuscript
Step 20a: Creating the NCX
Step 20b: Creating the linked Table of Contents

Front Matter
Step 21: Front matter
Step 21a: Blurbs (optional)
Step 21b: Title and copyright page (required!)
Step 21c: Add a Smashwords license statement below copyright page

The End of Your Book
Step 22: The end of your book

POST-FORMATTING
Step 23: Preparing your cover image
Step 24: Review requirements for Premium Catalog distribution

Uploading Your Book to Smashwords
Step 25: How to upload your book
Step 26: How AutoVetter works
Step 27: After you publish – check your work
Step 27a: Check for EPUBCHECK compliance (important!)

How to Market Your Book
Step 28: Read the Smashwords Book Marketing Guide

Helpful Resources
Send Feedback
About the Author

APPENDIX
Keyboard shortcuts (save hours with this tricks!)

Free Kindle Book: The Four Corners of the Sky

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http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=citofama-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=B003PJ7AU6&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr“A fabulously entertaining novel, part caper, part love story,” or “an ambitious work filled with innaccuracies and bordering on the absurd?”  You get to decide, because for a limited time, it’s Free at the Kindle Store.  Get it quick.