Today I Bake, Tomorrow I Brew

by Liana Posted on February 18, 2014
This entry is part 63 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

Heard back at last on where I strayed outside of the live elements area on the mass market cover for Dowse and Bleed. It would appear, I calculated the spine incorrectly—using their formula. Go figure.

It took a bit to sort out all the bits and pieces that go with the two sections I'm trying to write/revise, but I got that much done at least. It's only already afternoon. Ah, well.

There went 919 words on pulling together Lexanas. Now I just got to get them out of Lexanas.

And there went the updated cover of Dowse and Bleed [mass market] and submitted for review. Didn't mean to take time out from writing for that, but seriously excited to get this baby almost done.

I went ahead and got a start on the Invisible Ficathon, since the Lexanas exit is percolating. I got 263 words to finish up treat #1.

Word Counts:

  • Fiction: 1182 words
  • Poetry: 0 lines | 0 words
  • Blog: 315 words

February Totals

  • Fiction: 5630 words
  • Poetry: 16 lines | 59 words
  • Blog: 2566 words

Pieces Started Not Finished

  • Fiction: Hear the Stars, novella.
  • Nonfiction/Blog: Indie Author Guide to Genre, book/blog series.

Completed Pieces

  • Fanfic: “Wholeness of Self,” 783 words.
  • Poem: "Tell Me," 8 lines | 37 words.
  • Poem: "Mother," 8 lines | 22 words.
  • Fanfic: Invisible Ficathon Treat, 269 words.
Posted in Writing | Tagged , | Comments Off on Today I Bake, Tomorrow I Brew

Wordpress Catastrophe

by Liana Posted on February 18, 2014

So overnight, my website decides that the files for my five most important plugins simply don't exist. I can't sort that out until I get home, but needless to say, that worries me a great deal.

Gone are:

  • LiveJournal crossposter
  • Organize Series
  • Subheading
  • Reaction Buttons
  • My social media sharing plugin

and a couple others.

I changed my password and have to accept broken functionality on various parts of my website until I can load the backup files via ftp. If the original files are even gone.

Posted in Website | Tagged , | Comments Off on Wordpress Catastrophe

Yesterday was Good and Bad

by Liana Posted on February 17, 2014
This entry is part 62 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

I have a knack for being inspired on the days my sister decides to be clingy, which puts a real crimp in the getting things done, because I don't share any of my Liana work with her, so no writing while she's hovering. Hmph.

I did get a snippet written and shipped on the collaboration and ordered my updated proof of the trade edition of Dowse and Bleed. The mass market awaits more precise details on what I did wrong on the cover with the live elements. As there's no template, I followed their rules and apparently was still off somehow. When I'm done getting it right, I'm going to make my own template and make it available for anyone else who likes the size and wants to do one.

Going to count a blog post I drafted the day before as well.

Today, I'll try and be a good girl and get the stuff written that I percolated on yesterday. Wish me luck!

Word Counts:

  • Fiction: 176 words
  • Poetry: 0 lines | 0 words
  • Blog: 733 words

February Totals

  • Fiction: 4448 words
  • Poetry: 16 lines | 59 words
  • Blog: 2251 words

Pieces Started

  • Fanfic: "Wholeness of Self," one-shot.
  • Fiction: Hear the Stars, novella.
  • Nonfiction/Blog: Indie Author Guide to Genre, book/blog series.
  • Poem: "Tell Me."
  • Poem: "Mother."

Completed Pieces

  • Fanfic: “Wholeness of Self,” 783 words.
  • Poem: "Tell Me," 8 lines | 37 words.
  • Poem: "Mother," 8 lines | 22 words.
Posted in Publishing, Writing | Tagged , | Comments Off on Yesterday was Good and Bad

Confusing Method with Product

by Liana Posted on February 13, 2014

There are many issues that have me gnashing my teeth that people frequently confuse method with product, process with result. This is one excellent addressing of issue #14 or so of that peeve list.

If we understand story structure and can apply that knowledge, any drafting method could potentially work for us. With that skill under our belt, we can focus on the method that enables our writing to exhibit smooth story flow, natural dialogue, deep characterization, etc.

Some will find that plotting works for them, while others will discover that pantsing keeps them in touch with their muse-subconscious. For pantsers, stories will sometimes almost write themselves, right down to subtext, foreshadowing, subplots, character arcs, and themes.

Insinuating that writers should change their methods with insults or assumptions doesn’t solve an author’s underlying issues with structure. Pantsing isn’t broken or wrong if it works for you.

— Jami Gold, "In Defense of Pantsing"

Posted in Writing | Tagged | Comments Off on Confusing Method with Product

Author Outliers

by Liana Posted on February 12, 2014

When Amazon reports that self-published books make up 25% of the top 100 list, the reaction from many is that these are merely the outliers. We hear that authors stand no chance if they self-publish and that most won’t sell more than a dozen copies in their lifetime if they do. (The same people rarely point out that all bestsellers are outliers and that the vast majority of those who go the traditional route are never published at all.)

— The Report on Author Earnings

Posted in Publishing | Comments Off on Author Outliers

Metafiction vs. Fanfic

by Liana Posted on February 11, 2014

As for metafiction vs. fanfiction — I *do* think there’s value in having different terms, rather than lumping all derivative stories together, because not all of those derivative stories are talking to the same audience or trying to accomplish the same thing. I personally would reserve the term “fanfiction” for the intensely social realm of fandom, where the stories can be in conversation not just with the source material, but also with the fans and the other stories those fans have told (both about the source, and about other things). And I agree with your take on “metafiction;” I would use that word for fiction that is aware of its own fictionality in some fashion. That’s a different conversation, but it’s a cousin to the fanfiction one, and sometimes they overlap (as in the case of “The Chuck Writes Story”).

— Marie Brennan

Posted in Fandom | Tagged , | Comments Off on Metafiction vs. Fanfic

Not Much, But Good

by Liana Posted on February 11, 2014
This entry is part 61 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

I didn't write much, but what I wrote was important to the discovery effort. I'm 'discovering' the Revente family enough to give my collaborator more writing room.

Word Counts:

  • Fiction: 758 words
  • Poetry: 0 lines | 0 words
  • Blog: 52 words

February Totals

  • Fiction: 4272 words
  • Poetry: 16 lines | 59 words
  • Blog: 1518 words

Pieces Started

  • Fanfic: "Wholeness of Self," one-shot.
  • Fiction: Hear the Stars, novella.
  • Nonfiction/Blog: Indie Author Guide to Genre, book/blog series.
  • Poem: "Tell Me."
  • Poem: "Mother."

Completed Pieces

  • Fanfic: “Wholeness of Self,” 783 words.
  • Poem: "Tell Me," 8 lines | 37 words.
  • Poem: "Mother," 8 lines | 22 words.
Posted in Writing | Tagged , | Comments Off on Not Much, But Good

Realistic Fiction

by Liana Posted on February 7, 2014

When reviewers complain that a story element is "unrealistic," their real complaint is usually something else. When they say a handsome billionaire falling for a mousy secretary is "unrealistic," they're really saying that the characters were underdeveloped and their romance was flat and contrived. When they say the pat deus ex machina at the end was "unrealistic," they're really saying that it felt cheap. (In general, when people complain about the ending, the problem isn't the ending. The problem is the middle leading up to it.)

— "Ideal vs. Reality," T. K. Marnell

Posted in Journal, Writing | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Realistic Fiction

Scribbling Bits and Pieces

by Liana Posted on February 7, 2014
This entry is part 60 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

Started off with two snippets for the collaboration, then wrote a blog post that I don't intend to post until I have the following five to ten.

Word Counts:

  • Fiction: 599 words
  • Poetry: 16 lines | 59 words.
  • Blog: 246 words

February Totals

  • Fiction: 3514 words
  • Poetry: 16 lines | 59 words.
  • Blog: 1466 words

Pieces Started

  • Fanfic: "Wholeness of Self," one-shot.
  • Fiction: Hear the Stars, novella.
  • Nonfiction/Blog: Indie Author Guide to Genre, book/blog series.
  • Poem: "Tell Me."
  • Poem: "Mother."

Completed Pieces

  • Fanfic: “Wholeness of Self,” 783 words.
  • Poem: "Tell Me," 8 lines | 37 words.
  • Poem: "Mother," 8 lines | 22 words.
Posted in Journal | Comments Off on Scribbling Bits and Pieces

A Couple Ounces of Activity

by Liana Posted on February 5, 2014
This entry is part 59 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

Snippeted some on the collaboration. :salutes the 965 words:

Read here and there and cleaned out a lot of my LJ inbox and did little of great import but a lot to make me feel better about what's hanging over my head.

Word Counts:

  • Fiction: 965 words
  • Blog: 41 words

February Totals

  • Fiction: 2915 words
  • Blog: 1220 words

Pieces Started

  • Fanfic: "Wholeness of Self," one-shot.
  • Fiction: Hear the Stars, novella.

Completed Pieces

  • Fanfic: “Wholeness of Self,” 783 words.
Posted in Writing | Tagged | Comments Off on A Couple Ounces of Activity