Sunday, July 31, 2011

Done Two Awaiting Results and Riding

Finished Editing my second Novel Completely last night at 12:30AM.

Skipped church this morning to ride with my good friend Kenny Kutter, riding is a religious experience for me.

Awaiting Smashwords to update their sales results from the distribution network -Second Quarter results!

Art work for cover and trailer is the work now and consumed with random spare haunting of thoughts for the the sequels of Whisper and No Rules Of Engagement!  I will be doing the fun and magic part of writing again soon, creating a new Novel.  So Excited.

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Second Quarter Results

Smashwords distributes its authors books, that make it into their Premium Catalog, to numerous very large outside vendors.  My First Novel, "Whisper", made it into the Catalog and was distributed three days before the end of the first Quarter!  So obviously I had no sales reported through those networks as it may take a couple of days from the time they get them until they show up on their site.

My Book has been out there for the entire second quarter and the results, according to smashwords, are to be posted tomorrow, July 31.  I am excited to see if there are any sales.  I will be happy with one from any of the retailers!

I know from Amazon and Smashwords that 244 copies of my book are out there in the virtual library of other people.  Tomorrow I find out how many more copies are floating around and if people were interested enough to actually purchase it. 

I brag a lot about James Rollins through various posts.  His latest book cost me $12.99 as an e-book.  Before I would have complained but as an E-book author I am glad to see prices going up on e-books, that translates to more money for authors and hopefully more money for my work someday when I hit that level of greatness, and loyal following of readers.

Friday, July 29, 2011

Rewards

Besides being able to say you are a published Author, the best reward is Royalties!

Today July 29, 2011, I was notified Amazon dot com was direct depositing my first Royalty Payment from sales of my First Novel, which I published in January of this year.  The amount is laughable as my book is for sale for 99 cents and of which I get 31 cents per book sold. 

It was January 17, of this year that I posted I finished my first Novel!  Within six months I have earned enough to warrant them sending me a payment and for that I am pleased and proud.  As I have stated many times through out my various posts, "Whisper", will always be my worst book.  The fact that my first and worst book is sustaining itself with meager but consistent sales is inspiring for me.

I have finished the rewriting of my Second Novel, "No Rules Of Engagement" and just waiting to get the corrections from my editor.  Have been spending my time working on art work for the cover.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

History Tidbit

On today's date in 1945, a B-25 bomber crashed into the 78th floor of the Empire State Building.  The three people in the planer died along with 11 people from the building, and 26 people were injured.  The pilot flew into thick fog and descended to regain visibility and found himself surrounded by skyscrapers.
I know the thought that hit me when I first read this was what was a B-25 bomber doing flying over New York City this late in the year 1945.  The war in Europe was over and the war in the Pacific would be over shortly.  I remember when the tire company I work for used to be located across the street in a little four story brick building at 6300 St. John.  We had the bottom floor and the top floor and two other companies occupied the floors in the middle.  As I worked there and talked with people I learned what history I could about the building.
At one point during World War II the little building next door employed women to build sections of B-25 Bombers which would be trucked to the down town airport and assembled by women and then flown by women out east where they were readied to be sent into the war.
First I wanted to remind people of the tremendous effort our grandparents and great grandparents went to in order to retain our freedom and stop tyranny from conquering the globe.  Times are tough but mommy probably isn't building bombers all day or night to put food on the table while daddy is off fighting in the war.  Also hats off to the many women, who before the equal rights movement left their kids and went to work to help keep this country great.  It has been my experience that women call in less, work harder, more focused than their men counter parts.  The only complaint about women I have in general is they are twice as messy and don't clean up after themselves as well as men.  That last part comes from a period of cleaning restrooms for a summer at a major department store (a very nice store), and the woman's restrooms were always ten times more disgusting than the men's rooms.
The plane was probably just being brought from one airport to another for transport.  Especially since it only had a crew of three.  I never knew the Empire State Building had been hit by a plane until today!  Men need to work harder to keep up with the women, and the women need to tidy up when they are done in the restroom because somebody does come in and clean it later.  I shudder at the memories!

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

The Last Chapter

It's 12:35AM and I just finished the re-writing of the last chapter of my second novel.  Truly a Labor of Love!  Good night or Good Morning, I am crawling off to bed.

Freeze FBI!

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, famous for the blue jackets with yellow letters, FBI, across the back, all started one hundred and three years ago on this date in 1908.
President Teddy Roosevelt established the Bureau as part of the Justice Department and under the Attorney General.  It was given the mandate to enforce the government's regulatory policies, especially on the land grabs in the west and the growing business trusts in the east.
The Attorney General and first head of the FBI at the time was Charles Bonaparte.  Yes, he was related to the Bonaparte.  He was the grand nephew of the Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte.

Monday, July 25, 2011

Dean and Jerry

On this day in 1946 at the Club 500, in Atlantic City, NJ, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis made their debut as a comedy team!
As a child, I remembered watching the old black and white movies of the Keystone Cops, Buster Keaton, and Charlie Chaplin.  My favorites were always the comedy teams.  First of course always goes to Laurel and Hardy, second was Abbott and Costello, but hands down the funniest to me was Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.  Each were great in their own right.  What amazed me most was Dean Martin was a terrific singer and still one of my favorites to listen today.  Jerry Lewis was as smart as he was funny, and he was a riot!  When you put those two together magic happened!  I don't think anybody could really explain it, but everybody could see it, feel it, and it was funny!
Most people don't realize that Dean was very funny in his own right as well as being the best straight man ever.  As good as Dean was as a straight man, Jerry could routinely crack him up!
My wife knowing what a big fan of theirs that I am, bought me a set of DVD's which contains most of their Colgate Comedy Hour Television shows.  In one of the episodes, Jerry almost accidently almost steps on Dean's shoes.  Dean breaks character and warns Jerry to watch the shoes because they are suede and they're new!  Jerry makes it point to try and step on Dean's shoes through the rest of the skit.  Dean starts getting upset as he tries to avoid Jerry dancing around and taking shots at stepping on Dean's new shoes.  It is still hilarious to watch those old shows.
My Thank You and Farewell, to comedies greatest duet, Martin & Lewis!!!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

History Tidbit

Ernest Hemingway was born on this day in 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois.  He won a Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954.  His career began as a reporter in Kansas City.  He was a reporter during the Spanish civil war and was decorated for his efforts in Italy during World War I. 
On this day in history The Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, was destroyed by arson.  I wonder if they had fire insurance back then?
Along with Hemmingway the Scottish Poet Robert Burns shares his birthday, and American astronaunt Alan Sheppard!

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Dreams, the Future, and Writing

I realized today that I am living my dream now.  I finally figured out what my true passion is, which is writing.  I have published a book and it is still stunning me with people saying they couldn't put it down.  How they normally don't read books like that, of that genre, but they really enjoyed it and would definitely buy and read the sequel.  I am in the closing stages on my second novel.  It is already so far above my first book.  I have grown so much as a writer and learned so much in just the last year.  I can't imagine where I will be and what I will know in five years.

I am making a decent living in my current career and raising my family in hard and challenging times.  I don't know where the future is going to take me but if sales continue with my first book and the word keeps spreading at the rate it already is naturally with no promotion or advertising.  It is doing awesome for an unknown aspiring writer.  Nobody knows where their future is going!  I can see good things happening with what will always be my first and worst book.  If those who read Whisper and liked it also try my next book, No Rules Of Engagement and the word keeps spreading, things will continue to grow and in a good way.

The next two books I write will be sequels, SAC which will be the sequel to Whisper and recount Wiley Randolph's training and his tragic first mission.  Then will be the sequel to No Rules Of Engagement which will carry on the saga of Alexander Hawk, Intel and the crew.  Those who love the first two will be very surprised with the sequels.  That coupled with the fact that I am improving, week in and week out, as a writer.  From the constant lessons from my friend and Editor, articles, books, and the best instructor of all - Writing!

If I become successful as a writer or not, I absolutely love to do it.  I have found a calm, and inner peace over the last year as I have finished my first book, published it, finished my second book and have been spending seven to eight months rewriting and polishing it for publication.  Learning the importance and getting comfortable with editing, an rewriting.

Finding your passion has such a profound change in your life.  I am calmer, more at peace, more naturally motivated to do things, to push my self harder and in more areas than I have ever done before in my previous forty-four years.  I honestly feel like there are not enough hours in a day to do what I want to get done.  I have a list of things each day I want to accomplish and some days I even get close to getting them all done.  What I don't get done I roll over to the next and to the next.  My alarm clock goes off in the morning and I can't wait to get up, get ready and get to work.  Truly the difference between a job and a career is is your passion, motivation, and reason for doing what you do.

As I said I realized I am living my dream now.  Because success is the journey, not a destination.  I am on the right path, with direction and passion.  So nothing is going to stop me and where I end up will be fate, because nobody knows where they are going to end up and what life has in store for them.  I am blessed to have found my calling, my gift, my passion.  I love what I am doing!  From an optimistic point of view I have no where to go but up from where I am at with writing and just starting out.  I am enjoying being in the trenches and paying my dues, building a following of fans one book and one story at a time.  As long as I keep writing and turning out books, in time all my dreams will come true.  

Man on the Moon

Forty Two years ago, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the Moon.  Neil was first to set foot on the moon and Buzz planted the U.S. Flag to symbolize the United States won the Space Race which the Russians started with the launching of Sputnik.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Up Date and Laughing Fit

My wife took the boys to the lake this weekend with her family and left me to work on my second book.  Primarily editing!  I didn't get done what I had set out to do but did manage to get half of what I wanted to done.  Found a much better method of working.  The truly amazing part was how I was able to totally disengage my emotions from the editing.  It is almost as if I reached a new plateau in knowledge and experience as far as editing is concerned.
When I reached a section where my editor highlighted a whole section and put a note REWRITE – I just dove right in as if it were trying to write a post for my blog.  I can't say no emotions; it is just that my feelings for editing have changed.  I am sure a big part of the change is the realization we are getting close to the end.  The end is in sight!  So I was spurred on to give it all I had and not let anything slow my forward progress.  Yet I did manage to do what I felt was an excellent job making changes, it just took time and careful reading, and writing.
I do have a problem.  I will have to solve, and that’s how to get a picture of a blond headed, blue eyed, 8 year kid who looks very confident wearing a Black Nazi Gestapo uniform.  I need a left side profile shot so that the shoulder patch of the flag can be seen.  I have the information of a local costume shop and going to see if they have a Nazi uniform.  No, my second book is not about Nazi's, but a group does model their uniforms after the black pre 1938 Gestapo uniforms which were black with red piping.  The Nazi's quit using them after 1938 because they were deemed too intimidating and scary, which is why I choose that design for the troops in the book to wear.
Laughing Fit
I heard a comedian on the radio the other day but didn't catch his name.  His act snuck up on me because the first part I didn't find particularly funny but it got really funny towards the end of the clip and I got to laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes.  I had to pull my truck over to the shoulder of the road because I couldn't see to drive.
The first part of his act was about how we need to save paper and cake so people should be limited to the number of birthdays they are allowed to have during their life.  He said through your life you get 20 birthdays that you get to celebrate.  He went on to explain each one and why, this part was not very funny.
But later when you get to age 95 you don't get birthdays but for each year you make it another year older, another set of laws no longer applies to you.  (Not true – but this was the funny part.)
I don't remember hardly any of the details and I am positive I will thoroughly butcher what little I do remember.  I will post the comics name, if and when I find out who he is.
When your 95 you are allowed to steal anything you want!  If you can grab it with your hands and carry it out of somewhere and get it to your house, it belongs to you.  Frankly if a 95 year old person can steal it away from you, it really wasn't yours!
Somewhere between 96 and 99 you are allowed to drop anything you want, you can liter right in front of a cop and get away with it!  He even acted out a bit where an old person dropped something in front of a police officer.
One of the others between there was you can relieve yourself (PEE) anywhere in public and get away with it.  It won't make anybody around you very happy but seriously what are they going to do to you.
At 100 you can kill anybody you want!  You're still not allowed to shoot them, stab them or poison them!  As long as you use only your own two hands and your own strength!  If you get strangled to death by a 100 year old person you probably deserve to be dead!
I lost it somewhere between 96 and 99 and had pulled over by the time he hit 100 because I didn't want to kill myself because I was having a laughing fit while trying to drive.  I am sure the other drivers passing me thought I was crazy as hell, pulling over to wipe my eyes laughing hysterically!
I pity my children and grand children if I reach that age in life!!

Friday, July 15, 2011

City Deliveries

Something that sounds so simple and is taken for granted is city delivery of tires.
My day job, besides being an undiscovered awesome New York Best Selling Author (Well, not yet, but someday!) is being the Operations Manager of a Tire Wholesaler in Kansas City, Missouri.  I wasn't always the Operations Manager.  Nineteen years ago I was a warehouse man/ Driver for the company.  Back then our city deliveries were done with two trucks, one went one way and the other went the other direction.  We did two routes a day, a morning city delivery and an afternoon city delivery, with the same two trucks.
Over the years the numbers of stops have grown as has our customer base, the amount of tires we stock, the area we service, everything has grown as we have grown as a company.
Let me preface something about the tire industry most people don't know.  Most major cities have one to two wholesalers.  Kansas City, which sits just about in the middle of the country, has five wholesalers.  The biggest reason for this is because Kansas City, amongst other things, is a transportation hub.  We have three major Interstates which run through the city, and a massive collection of Rail yards.  Most major cities have tire deliveries, but in a lot of cases it's once a day.  For as long as I have worked in Kansas City in the tire business we have run twice a day city deliveries.  All the other wholesalers do also because we do!  Competition for tire sales in the city is fierce at best!  Because of that the people of Kansas City, without realizing it, have the greatest choice, best prices, and by far the best service than anywhere else in the country when it comes to purchasing new tires.
As I have said we do this magic trick, Monday through Friday, and once a day on Saturday, week in and week out, no matter what the weather might be doing, year after year.  It is truly amazing how we do it.  Keeping 21 trucks serviced, I said we had grown, eight of which run twice a day in the Kansas City Metro area.  Taking the orders, getting them pulled, and staged.  Twice a day you will hear somebody in our order entry department yell out, "Anybody got anybody?"  This translates into 'Last Call' for us.  If they are on the phone and giving you an order it will make the next route, otherwise it will be on the next available delivery.
The next fifteen minutes is the magic time!  The routes are handed out to the drivers so they can write up their route sheets.  These sheets tell us who they are delivering to, what truck they are driving, what company cell phone they have, and who is driving that route.  On the back of the sheet is a truck inspection form where the drivers fill out twice a day the condition of the vehicle they are driving and anything that needs repaired, checked out, or fixed on that vehicle.  Which usually is nothing!  We keep our fleet in top notch condition otherwise we wouldn't be able to do what I am describing so faithfully.  Most companies do vehicle maintenance every ten thousand miles and we routinely do ours every eight thousand miles.  The trucks are kept in the best possible condition we can keep them in because they are an integral part of how we make a living.
The drivers write up their route sheets, make a copy to leave in the office, take their routes to the dock and begin loading.  Somebody looks at the invoice while somebody else finds the tires and checks each and every one of them.  For condition of the tire.  Is it the right size?  The right speed rating?  The correct ply?  The correct part number?  If anybody gets caught looking at the tags instead of the sidewall of the tires they get terribly teased and possibly yelled at that "We sell tires, not tags!"  This is our last chance to get it right before the tire gets to the customer.
Mean while all the last minute add-ons are being pulled, pick tickets invoiced and ran to the dock to be added to routes getting loaded.  A manager is always there helping to load, watching what's going on.  The fans get shut off in the summer time, and it is as quiet as we can make it so people can hear the tires sizes being called out and people checking their tires against the invoices.  Trucks are being loaded.  Tires are physically thrown from where they are staged across the dock and into the backs of the delivery trucks.  The area to between the staging area and the backs of the trucks is no man's land as tires are flying, rolling, and sailing into trucks where warehouse workers are lacing the tires into the back of the truck.  It is chaos at its finest!
Lacing is a tire people term, you set a row of tires down across the back and bottom of a truck with them spaced bead to bead, and then when you hit the side of the truck the tires get put in the opposite direction and you switch every time you hit the other side.  Done correctly the tire tags will be facing out with any whitewalls or raised white letters facing up.  Looking at the wall of tires stacked in the back of a truck it looks like shoe laces do.  So it is referred to as lacing a truck, or loading it with tires in the proper tire people way.
Once the trucks are loaded every tire left in the staging area is checked.  Was it cancelled?  Wrong size or type and someone had to re-pull the proper tires.  Once every question has been answered and checked, this also involves one guy in the office with a radio and the manager on the dock with a radio.  Once all is good and checked the drivers are released and eight trucks pull away from the dock for their next route.
I love standing on the outside dock watching my city trucks leave.  Almost every time it reminds of the character on the movie, "Memphis Belle," the Squadron Commander who watches his planes leave and then hours later is back outside counting them as they return, each time hoping to get them all back safe and sound.  Every time they all come back with no accidents, no mistakes it is a VERY GOOD DAY!  I have a lot of very good days.  We go to a lot of work to ensure that we are safe, well maintained, ready to load when the cut off time is near, and the trucks loaded and leaving on time so no one has to be rushed.  Between the cutoff and the trucks leaving is generally 15 minutes for eight trucks.  Day in and day out!  We do make it look easy!

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Computers, Mathematics, and Music

Somebody relayed to me recently that something that bothered them was that Science Fiction writers keep assuming that computers for aliens (those not of Earth) would be the same as Earth's.  This comment has bothered me since I heard it.  I happen to be one of those people who will ponder concepts, ideas, problems, and such for days, weeks and even months before reaching a solution I am happy with.  A solution that explains the situation, figures out the problem, in a way that I can live with, given my beliefs and limited education.
A computer at its very simplest form is a switch.  It's on or it's off.  From series and groupings of switches in various positions you get logic gates which can be used to compare, evaluate, or do mathematical functions with the values that are fed into it through various arrangements of on and off.  Granted from this modest beginning we have definitely taken this to an extreme from the standpoint of where computers were just sixty years ago.  I can't help but deduce that any computer system anywhere will be, has to be, a version or variation of what we have come up with.  The computer language most definitely will be different, the sophistication of security may vary, and the means of putting data in and getting it out will probably look different.
Assuming an intelligent being has the faculties it would need to move and interact with the universe it would have to have some means of sight, smell, taste, hearing, and touch at even the basic levels.  Their computer systems would be set up to take input from them, do the things that we need computers to do, and have means of displaying results, readings, and manipulations back out to the operators.  The only futuristic setting which would greatly differ from this model would be intelligent machines that designe and built its own versions of machines for the various tasks it needs accomplished.  I truly hope we never run into anything of the sort because we would be readily exterminated as a virus, or infestation of some sort.
Computers are too much pure logic, math based to be any different from ours.  Just like an Alien race would have a systems of weight and measures.  It wouldn't match ours but it would still be able to be convertible in short order.  It would be the same with computer technology, it wouldn't match but it could be easily convertible once like items could be compared and at a base level it would still be a series of logic gates and switches.  An Alien species can't have different math than we do.  The symbols may differ but the concept is universal!  It has to be!  Nowhere in the universe because you're in a different place dealing with different species would two plus two equal anything but four.
That brings me to Music!  If a being has the ability to listen, they will have music.  It is another universal constant.  At a base level it is frequencies, and timing.  I honestly believe Physicists one of these days are going to stumble across the connection music plays, with vibrations and noise of differing means to all the other fields of physics and they will then have their grand unification theory which explains everything.  Music is mathematics on a grand multi-dimensional level that actually incorporates time and the movement through time as it is being played.
I have read about ancient texts where supposedly machines were flown through the air using mercury and sound as the power for the lift and propulsion.  I have also read and seen illustrations were a group of monks with instruments would get in a semi-circle and using the noise and tempo of the music to lift objects through the air.  Primarily this was said to be used to move large cut stones from one place to another during the construction of temples and buildings.  In the Bible the story of Jericho, the soldiers are told to circle the place so many times and then everybody stop turn toward the walls of the city and blow their horns and the walls of the city collapsed allowing them to attack the city.  I can't say what I actually believe or not from these ancient texts, but I get the feeling there is a lot going on with the physics of sound and how it relates to us, the universe, and everything in between that we don't know about yet!
I had a face book status update this morning that related that I need a waterproof computer and a larger hot water tank to accommodate the bursts of brilliance I get in the shower some mornings.  This is what hit me and occupied my mind from 6:15 – 6:30 today as I was preparing to start the day.  It was much more elaborately spoken in my mind than I have written it here.  I hate to think of the inspirations that have crossed my mind and might as well have went down the drain with the water, because they were never recalled, written about, or recorded in any fashion what so ever.  Reason number 28 to have a Blog!

Segway Jousting

It gets around this time of the year and just a football commercial on television can get me excited.  I am not the all consumed sports fan who has to watch every football game I can get, but I love football season and watching and rooting for our home town Kansas City Chiefs!  I try not to miss a game.  I much prefer watching at home in my own living room rather than at the stadium which is maybe ten minutes from my house.  I don't like crowds, traffic, or beer so sitting at home drinking Kool Aid and eating hot dogs cooked out on the grill is enough to keep me happy.
One day some time ago discussing the direction of the team and our thoughts on the upcoming season with one of my crew, I suggested out of the blue, what I would love to see at the Stadium would be Segway Jousting!  Two smooth lanes separated by a tiny wall, two idiots on Segways wearing armor and helmets with lances charging into each other.  The would be no end to idiots to sign up and try and kill each other.  I bet with very little advertising you could fill Arrow Head Stadium at twenty-five bucks a head and five dollars for parking to watch the carnage.  That's doesn't even take into account the concessions.
If every major city with a Stadium had their own tournament, then do finals televised, and then the Champions would compete globally!
That's a million dollar idea any day of the week!  I would organize it and do it but I want to be a writer more than anything else in the world.  Not just a writer!  I want people counting down until my next book hits the shelves.  Or computer Net, if I am still self publishing!  Just relaying this makes me want to watch the movie with Heath Ledger, "A Knight's Tale."

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Life Interupts Passion

This is strictly an apology for not posting, and happily complaining that I have enough things in my life that my life is fully invading my passion of writing, editing, and getting my second novel ready to publish.

Possible posts I didn't get to but may someday.

Mrs. Fords next door neighbor was Leonard Firestone!  Of the Firestone Tires Firestone's!

Revolts Yesterday's Date during Abraham Lincolns Administration.  People forget things could be worse, when he raised the amount of people who needed to be drafted and rich families could buy a replacement for $300.00 there were public revolts!

How I got stupid and rode an electric Bull last Saturday!  OK, how I sat on an electric bull spin once and was thrown through the air.  The stupid part was getting back on repeatedly!

My Boss got to go to the American League Baseball thing in Arizona from Sunday to today.  When he is gone I have to run the place, a bit more involved than my regular job of Operations Manager.  That coupled with one of the side responsibilities I have is to make sure the tire warehouse gets counted throughout the year.  When we have days of light in coming freight we count more, more work for me.  We have had two days of no Freight so I have been non-stop running, working like I was doing three jobs.  I am not complaining, I would rather be busy with a job than unemployed any day.

Good News is my wife and the boys may be going to the lake this weekend with her family, and besides working Saturday Morning, the rest of the time I can write, edit, and hopefully finish the re-write of the book and get into the final stages of editing with my editor.  God willing I might enter next week with only a small bit of editing to be done, cover art, and book trailer to finish in order to be ready to publish my second novel.  It feels so good just to be this close.

The thought of having it all done and just waiting to publish is exciting.  To start earnestly writing again, new material - rough draft stuff ( The Fun Part ) of writing.  The truly creative part of writing.  Oh, to start my third book by the beginning of this next month would be unbelievable!  I have grown and learned so much since writing these first two novels.  It truly is a passion.  Say a prayer, cross your fingers, and better posts with real substance will be coming soon.  Maybe a story about a Bull and an idiot!!

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Book Reviews, Critiques, and Writing

I am probably a good example of the average American.  I read, lately not enough, but I forget to go and write book reviews of the books I have read.  I recently read a blog posting of a lady who just got her first review and it reminded me of the excitement I get when I read a new book review of my book.  I only have one book published but I still get excited when I read a new book review of my one book. 

I especially like good honest critiques of rough draft material, likes and dislikes, what people think of the characters, what they liked about the book as a whole and what they didn't like.  I think getting that feed back and acting on it, before it's published is truly what is going to help make me a great writer in the end.  I got that tidbit from one of the masters, Mr. Ken Follett, in his writings to aspiring writers!  I still need to get a dedicated group of beta readers who will a finish reading in time to critique my work before I get through the editing and rewriting part, and will be able provide the valuable advise I am looking for as to what might make it a better book overall.  I am still very early in this process of becoming a writer so I have time to hone my list of helpers and beta readers before I get successful. 

We should all make a point of getting people, fellow authors, especially our readers, to write book reviews of the stuff they are reading.  I will work on it also.  People get busy and forget or side tracked and don't finish books they are reading.  Some books I finish fast, some slow, some for information & inspiration, some for mere enjoyment.  Either way I need to become a better reviewer. 

Lately in my life I have been so tunnel visioned on working on my second novel that life has been playing catch up with me this last week, and I have been forcibly busy every evening, and weekend, and have to literally steal minutes here or there to edit.  Read a sentence and go do something while I try to rewrite a line in my head, jot down ideas on a napkin and sneak back to it later to rewrite one sentence and then do it all over again.  I have felt sneaky, as if I am having an affair with my novel, desperately wanting to shut the world out and give it a whole three to four hours of solid attention.  I dream of taking a day off work, running off with my computer to some secluded place and seeing what I could do with eight to ten hours of hard work, a coffee maker, a loaf of bread and some lunch meat to make sandwiches if I get hungry.  To immerse myself in my work whole heartily. 

I so dream of a day when I can get up and get ready, fix breakfast for the family, kiss them good bye, and scoot them out the door, and go to an office in my own home with book shelves and my library, note pads, dry erase boards, my computer, soft music playing in the back ground and loose myself in cranking out books.  Do laundry, work out and cook dinner late in the afternoon, have dinner with the family and then back to my office to edit and rewrite past work in the evenings.  It's a long way off, but that's the dream, the job of a life time, a career, that I can do until I can't type, see, or they plant me in the ground.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Air Superiority

If you are involved in an armed conflict anytime since the late nineteen thirties, air superiority has been a major concern.  He who controls the air definitely has a major advantage.
I was born in 1966, and the Apollo program was well on its way before I was old enough to really understand what our country was doing in regards to the Space Race.  By the time I was in grade school I knew who Chuck Yeager, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin were.  I had a picture on my bed room wall of the crew of Apollo 11 and dreamed of being a fighter pilot until I got glasses in fifth grade.  I know Chuck Yeager was not part of Apollo eleven, but anybody whose father was in the United States Air Force in the nineteen-sixties knew who Chuck Yeager was.  The man was a freaking legend!
As we pass a low point in American History where the Space Shuttle is to be retired and there is no brand new wonderful craft to capture the imagination of the youth of this great country.  As we effectively turn off the extension of what was started with Gemini, Apollo, and the Space shuttles.  As we wonder if there will be a NASA in our near future.  What will the poor kids going to space camp have to look forward to?  Catching a ride on a Russian space craft?  President Kennedy I am sure is turning over in his grave!!
In the Reagan administration our government came up with the Star Wars Program.  Do you think the Russians are going to maintain that expensive system, which was probably one of the turning points in ending the cold war and the allowing the Berlin wall to come down?  The future of Gene Rodenberry's future of The Federation and fleets of Star Ships exploring the Universe is also being retired.  We are closing a chapter of American leadership, some of our finest hours of existence as Humans, not just Americans, by the kick in the teeth to this fine institution.
We are giving up our air superiority of space!  To what end?  To what future?  I am waiting for the secret police to start showing up in neighborhoods to separate of society into slave, to be killed, or worse, while they disarm our nation by force.  George Orwell's 1984 meets the modern Nazi Party in socialistic dominance of the planet, because dreams don't need to be supported in that kind of culture.  We don't need a space program for what they are planning for our future.  You can be anything you want when you grow up, as long as it isn't an astronaut or FREE.
Enjoy this post because free speech, blogging, posts, the texting will all be shut down in short order.  They are as dangerous as college professors, reading and dreaming.  As dangerous as a group of people who desire to be free.  Radical thoughts like these can't be tolerated in the future we are marching towards.  So polish your boots or start liking seeing a world through barbed wire, because the only other choice will be a mass grave.
It is a sad day for our fellow Americans.

Friday, July 8, 2011

Audience

If you have a Blog, you get a special screen which is referred to as a dashboard.  On mine there are six tabs.
Posting, Comments, Settings, Design, Monetize, and Stats.

I Love the Stats!  It shows how many people have visited my blog, what type of system they were using to view it, what platform they were directed from, and from what county they were from who viewed my blog.  Under Stats is a tab that says Audience.  Obviously the top of the list is always the United States with the most hits, but in the last week the Ukraine has been number two!

It just boggles my mind trying to figure out what I am writing about that is catching the attention of people from the country of the Ukraine?  So if you are reading this post and you are from the Ukraine, please leave a comment telling me what posts were of interest, that you liked, didn't like, want to see more posts about which topics, etc.  It will help quench my curiosity!

If you are from a country besides the United States, please leave a comment as to likes and dislikes, good or bad.  I would love to hear from the people who are viewing my posts.  If you are from the United States, Please feel free to leave a comment also, I don't mean to exclude you.  The United States is my Primary Audience and probably always will be.  I just get curious about the people from other countries who visit my Blog and read my posts.  My plan is to use this Blog as a four fold platform.

1.  To share my insights, discoveries, and trials as I make my way through the world of publishing as I become a world famous best selling author!  As I am slow, sometimes dim witted, and not too bright - just ask my editor, she can verify any of this, this part will be a slow and lengthy process.

2.  To promote my books, my writing, blow my own horn, toot my whistle and all that jazz.  Only published one book so far, next one will hopefully be out September 11th.  Again, going to be a slow process.

3.  To promote other authors, who I enjoy reading their stuff.  James Rollins, Jo Murphey, James Patterson, Ken Follett and Jack Higgins.  I could go on for days.

4.  History tidbits, Rants, Raves, and any other crap I feel like expounding on at the moment - pretty much filler, non-sense, and my opinions, which frankly don't matter any more than the history stuff which has already happened, old news, but I enjoy it!  Writing these parts is just stretching my mind, giving me a break from the tedious and monotonous mountain of editing.  It's a lot because my English skills suck.  Not the best place to start from when you desire to make a living from writing!  Thank God I have a real job!

I don't put ad's on here, or other stuff to clutter things up.  I hope to gain a large following of people who will read or not read what I write - but that when they do read my posts, that they might learn something, share a feeling, make a connection, and have a brief human moment in this crazy fast paced world.  I hope it's entertaining, and heart felt, and that my readers realize how real and honest I write about things here.  Maybe if they enjoy pieces of this they may read my books someday.  If not I hope they read the authors I mention, even if it's Nicholas Sparks.  Just don't expect me to run out and buy any of his books. 

Please leave a comment if you enjoyed any part of your experience during your visit here.
Ask questions! 
Click to follow if you want to be notified that my mind dribbled onto the Net yet again.  If you read something that especially touches you, share it with a friend.  Blogs, Social sites, the Internet; It's about people connecting with other people, sharing thoughts, and ideas.  SHARING!

How times have changed

As I mentioned the building I work in yesterday in my post, and all of its little hiding places.  Several things come to mind about how things have changed.  Originally this building was built in the shape of a Giant U.  This allowed the rail lines that run up to the building to bring train cars into the middle of the U shape in the center of the building to be unloaded from the inside of the building while one side of the building did shipping and the other side offered an enormous retail outlet for the public.
The people who built the original structure in the early 1900's built this place to last for a long time.  In the nineteen-sixties they filled in the train court up the middle with concrete and put a cheap crappy roof over it.  It is an insult to the rest of the structure!  I say it is a cheap crappy roof because the building maintenance people have a full time company that does nothing but cheaply patch leaks and bad spots in the roof covering the old train court.
The concrete that was poured into the train court area in the 1960's is sinking in one area.  A subcontractor was called in to cut a hole in the floor and see what the problem is.  They were expecting to cut through ten inches or more of steel reinforced concrete when they went to cut the hole in the floor.  It was discovered that they filled the train court with dirt, a layer of gravel, a layer of sand, one screen mesh of steel and three inches of concrete poured over the mesh.  My driveway at my house has more steel and thicker concrete than the floor in the center of this warehouse!
Again, this is an insult to the original structure, which more than likely will last another hundred years.  The part they added in the 1960's won't last another twenty years.  It all comes down to workmanship.  Caring about what you building and creating.  Doing a job right and to last.
The other major thing that I think about when walking through this wonderful old building is when this place was built, cutting edge electronics were components sealed in glass tubes.  This place has many control rooms where panels are still mounted with manual throw switches, massive turning switches with multiple brass contacts underneath the control arms.  There are banks of large industrial fuses.  Most of these control panels date back to the original DC power system which controlled the original power of the building.  Then there is the original AC components which were added much later and caged in because they didn't have rooms specially built to house them because they were added later to keep up with changing times.
During our relatively short stay here compared to the age of the building we have added state of the art security electronics throughout the warehouse.  There are electronic beams, motion sensors, and security cameras.  You can see the new computer lines that run multiple T1 lines into our computer room.  The cables that run out and support the Wi-Fi computer hot spots which allow us to use wireless communication with the various laptops the warehouse men use to enter the bin locations for the tires they are putting away.
One of the newest innovations coming out in tires is RF tags built into the tires.  These tags are flat and contain a tiny battery and computer chip which holds all the information about that tire.  Scanners can be used at the doors of the building to record every time a tire passes through a door.  This can be used as a double check against the manual checking of received inventory as tires are coming off a truck.  It can also be used to check the tires loaded onto a truck against the invoices for the customers and what the computer says we billed and shipped.  These tags can be pinged by a computer and they all will ping back, allowing for an almost instantaneous inventory of the tires in the building.  With three sensors situated throughout the warehouse, it will be possible to ping a single tire and using the three sensors our computer will be able to triangulate the position of the tire within the warehouse and tell a warehouse person where the tire is at.  We aren't up to speed with all of this technology yet, but our company is experimenting with aspects of electronic computer controlled inventory systems to help us maintain our high level of accuracy with our ever growing inventory of tires.
Basically I just love how we have melded with the old building.  Community Tire was founded in St. Louis in 1935, and fairly recently moved from their Broadway location in St. Louis to a new state of the art facility in Hazelwood, MO.  Our Kansas City branch has been in the area since the early eighties and I have been blessed enough to have been a part of the company for nineteen years, working on my twentieth.  Seeing the changes in our company, the changes in technology in just the last nineteen years has been amazing.  Walk through this place and look at the hundred year old electronic equipment and it is mind blowing how the times have changed.

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Medicated and Doing Much Better

It rained!!  Which my thanks to God, the water falling from the sky, kills and drowns the little puffs of white fluffy bits of cotton stuff floating around the area and washes it all to hell. 

It was supposed to rain yesterday, but didn't, Complaint Department Please!

Also because of the care and love of my wife, the wonders of modern over the counter (kind of) drugs for allergies, I am much better today than I was yesterday.

Just in time, because I am working my last of five thirteen hour days at my day job.  Congrats to Derrick, our night manager, who I have been helping out covering his shift for him over the last two weeks.  He and his wife were blessed with another beautiful healthy baby!

Anybody having infertility problems should contact me so I can send you a bottle of our magic Baby water.  This is the third time that this has happened here in the time I have worked here since we found and started using the old rusty water cooler.  I should SELL the water!  I might get more money from that than selling books!  Maybe I should write a story about the magic water cooler.

Keep in mind I am an aspiring writer and tend to exaggerate and get carried away with Stories, but the Title of the Blog should have given you a hint 'STORY TELLER'.

This branch of the company I work for is located in the old Montgomery Wards Distribution Center in Kansas City, MO.  It was built in the very early 1900's.  It was built before electricity became standardized AC - because in the basement is two of the worlds largest DC Generators and that's what powered the place until AC took over and all the other electrical was added to the outside of the existing walls after the fact.  Historical Note - The DC Generators ran the elevators in the building until it was closed in 1979.
After 1979 the building was vacant for a few years, bought and now there are numerous different businesses throughout the building.  The building is ten stories tall, three and a half blocks long and over a hundred years old.

We used to be in the bottom floor on the back side of the building.  Quite a few years ago we out grew that space and moved to an area one floor up and entered from the other side of the building and doubled our space.  Somewhere through the move we found in one of the thousands of hiding spots, a ancient electric water cooler that takes the upturned bottles of water.  We plugged it in and it worked.  We cleaned it out real good and started using it in the tire warehouse.  It gives out the coldest water ever, and is supplied by a National Water company that says the water comes from a natural spring! 

Three times since then there has been a period where half the guys in the place, their wives all get pregnant around the same time.  It isn't that the women's cycles are lining up because of contact with each other, none of the wives know each other, and maybe see each other once a year at a company family function.  Every one here swears it's the water from the old cooler.  They say if a guy drinks from it, his wife will get pregnant, or girl friend, or whom ever he is seeing.  I have two boys as a result of it, if that's the cause?  You know it's the water?

Personally I feel the answer lies in the fact we have a great crew, we all work everyday, and it is hard work.  I have got the healthiest bunch of men in the city working here.  They literally get paid to work out eight hours a day, or more sometimes.  When people first start it is really hard on them, until their body gets used to the punishment.  We have a high turnover rate of new employee's, once somebody makes it past their 90 days they are generally here for the long haul.  Regular work, great shape, if other areas of their life are going good also, given time, that will also produce babies.  As far as the frequency of all the women getting pregnant around the same time, I can't explain that, unless it's the water.

I Have a Great Idea for a Story!

As my many acquaintances, Face book friends, people at church, and especially those fine individuals who I work with every day at my day job, all find out that I am an aspiring writer and I have published a book, everybody has an idea for a story.

This explains why their has been such an influx of things being published as the world of self publishing has been birthed and is growing into it's own organism.  More people are taking their stories, writing them, and self publishing them.  Let's face it everybody has a story, even if it's just their own.

I have a couple of problems with the sharing of ideas by those to lazy to go through the monumental effort of writing a book, re writing the same book, editing the book, going through it what seems like a million and a half times before you ever publish it. 

1.  Many times their Epiphany is some movie that is due to come out or the advertisements for next seasons television shows they heard or seen and forgot they heard or seen and now believe this is their original idea.

2.  What if you use one of these ideas and that friend that gave it to you ends up being a ex-employee, ex-friend, who is holding a grudge against you years from now after you went through all the work to take that simple idea and turn it into a book.  They may decide to sue you over the rights to the story?

First off, the only way I can be truly sure I never get sued, or if I do that they will never win the case is I come up with my own stories, characters, scenes, action sequences, dialogue between the characters, and nobody is twisted in just the same way that I am.  If they are they are probably writing their own books.  The only person who could claim any rights to my stories besides me would be my editor, who besides me is the only other person who is as intimate with my book as I am, and has given as much of her self as I have. 

Secondly, on a personal note, when I am done with a story, I am done with it.  I have been through it so many times on such a mechanical non emotional level for so long I can't wait to publish it and get onto something new, to let my muse tickle my fancy and let my imagination run wild once again.

Part of my processes for plot twists is to try and write myself into corners, create problems and then go solve them.  To juggle a problem in my sub-conscious always there and present as I go through out the course of my day.  To throw different solutions at it and let each run it's course until it dead ends and start over again.  Usually by the time I done I have several solutions picked out that will work, and one I want to use in my story. 

How do I know somebody would never win a case against me as far as whose story idea it was.  Because I have what they don't.  Files with diagram's, character sheets, rough drafts of scenes, chapters, first draft, second draft, you can see the story take shape from it's beginning to end, see how the plot twists and surprising solutions were arrived at.  Diagrams of the actions scenes so I can keep track of who is where and what was going on over there as I wrote the story.  Somebody else would not have all that crap or a finished book to back it all up with. 

The other problem with all of this is, it not that I don't trust my friends, or believe they have good ideas.  I have kind of liked a few that I have heard over time.  I make a point of never writing down a story idea I get from somebody else, so my natural tendency of when I sleep and wake up it will be cleared and erased from my mind.

I do write down my own story ideas and put them in a folder.  When and if the idea germinates and grows into something that out grows the folder it gets it's own folder and still waits until I done with what I am currently working on.  Later when the other projects are done I will go to this hidden vault and grab one of the waiting original ideas that are all mine.

As it stands I have over 30 ideas, or books to write, that will be enough to keep me very busy writing and trying to publish two books a year for the next fifteen years.  If providence and the reading world so shines up to my stories and financially I can stay home and do this full time I will endeavor to do more in less time.  The creative part is the easy and fun part and I will probably never run out of great stuff to read, and never run of of great stuff to write.

On that note, there is so much out there to pick from to read, if you don't thoroughly enjoy what your reading put it down and get something else.  Life is too short and reading is a blessing, relaxing, exciting, fun, enjoyable, informational, and yours to pick!  On the flip side of the coin if you don't like what I am writing, I am OK with that!  Read Something You Enjoy!!  I enjoy what I write!  I write what I would like to read but nobody has written it yet, so I had to write my own book!  Obviously there are others with similar tastes as mine, but I realize it won't be every body's cup of tea. 

My Second Novel is packed full of cussing!  This bothers me on one level, but by leaving the cussing in there I am being true to my self and the story.  I want those parts of the book to be shocking, and upsetting, and in your face in an offensive way.  So it stays.  Not all my books will be so crude in their language.  But this book is because also I know where the second and third books are going to go already!  I know where these characters end up in the end!  The changes would not be so dramatic if they didn't start where they did and come from where they did, confused, give it a couple of years and three books from now and it will all make perfect sense.

Have a Great Idea?  Is it yours?  Is it original?  If your answer to all three of these is YES, you should be writing a book, I think.  If your your answer is NO, go find a good book and lose yourself in it.  I mean that in a positive and happy kind of way!

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Drought and Flooding

Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri are flooding.  Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico are experiencing a drought.  Africa is having the worst drought in years.

We can't do any thing about Africa.  But in this country we could build aqueducts to move water around the country and even build giant holding tanks to pump water into and save to release at later dates.  Missouri is flooding in different areas on a regular basis, and I am certain that there are areas that experience droughts on a regular basis.  In a time when our country needs jobs we could spend years building these projects and some time in the future we would benefit from the relief of flooding and the benefit of water where it is needed when there is a shortage.  Just an idea.

Meth Claritin D and the cotton stuff

Yesterday I posted numerous posts and felt great, and today a natural event bought me to my knees.  For those who don't know about the trees, I believe they are called 'cotton woods', but what ever they are, from time to time they secrete little white fluffy things into the air.

If you have noticed my profile pictures, I am bald.  The doctors call it alopecia areata, but I know it got worse when my allergies changed as reached adult hood.  I am convinced they are related.  I have a goatee beard, hair on my chest and other areas, but my head is smooth as ever and I never have to shave it.  Allergies!  I know rag weed could potentially kill me just being near it.  The fluffy cotton stuff in the air from these trees is debilitating to me.  I get a sinus headache like what I imagine a migraine is like.

So today I didn't get much of anything accomplished and am just now at 9:45PM with taking a Claritin D, and sitting in air conditioning for the last few hours am I beginning to feel normal and good again.

I wanted to say thank you to the many Meth creators and dealers for making such a miracle drug like Claritin D is for people like me with allergies such a task to purchase.  I take one a day, except for days like today where I was out and had to have my wife drive me to the pharmacy to get some after I got off work.  They have to scan my drivers license, sign a computer thing, and now there is a new step in order to track the sale and distribution of this drug. 

Wouldn't it be easier to investigate the people like me that are habitual purchasers of this drug and rule us out as Meth creators and then those that are left are the ones you should be focusing on.  Those of us who are legally taking this drug for what it is designed for have nothing to hide.  Just a thought. 

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

That's All Right

I'm on Fire Today, HISTORY TIDBIT

On this day July 5th in 1954 Elvis Presley auditions at Sun Records for Sam Phillips.  Two days later, "That's All Right" is played on Memphis radio and the Era of Rock and Roll begins.

I play around with time travel in my books and have several posts dedicated to the subject, and I would have loved to have seen in an alternate universe how things would have played out had Buddy Holly not died in the air plane crash with the other stars on that fateful day.  Buddy Holly had a much greater success ratio starting off than Elvis did and I have heard good debates concerning if he hadn't of died he may have become the King of Rock -n- Roll and not Elvis.  I love both of their music and most of the other performers of that era, so it wouldn't have bothered me anyway. 

It killed me that one of the Crickets died in Sugar Creek, MO just outside of Independence, MO, where I live a few years ago and hardly anybody knew who he was or payed it any never mind.  I will always remember.  Just like I can't listen to a Sam Cooke Song with out thinking of Buddy Holly playing as his opening band on tour.  The only way Buddy could stay at the same places Mr. Cooke did was Sam would say Buddy and the Crickets were his entourage. 

E-Mail sent to a Self Publishing House

As I have stated through out several of the posts on my Blog, I researched the Publishing Industry, rather thoroughly before decideing on self publishing via Smashwords dot com and Amazon dot com.   I will not share with the readers of my blog the full extent to which I investigated the publishing industry as if I did it may someday prove very embaressing for certain agents, their companies, and certain publishing companies.  Plus, I may want to be published by them some day when I am not a complete unknown and have a following, and fan base, and when they would love to have my business at terms that I may get to dictate.

Anyway, one of the companies I contacted in my reseach is persistent at best.  They keep contacting me in different forms to solicite my buisness for me to pay them to print my book in one of their many self publishing packages.  Unfortuately they do not research their potential client list as well as their client lists investigate them.  So because it's the day after the fourth of July and not the busiest Tuesday I could have, I decided to answer their latest query for my business.  I thought I would share the E-mail ( My side of it) in a post.  In all fairness to the company, which I am sure is a good and forth right company I will not share their side of the letter. (NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED TO PROTECT THE INNOCENT.)


Dear JOAN OF ARC

My publishing package has been decided, and no reflection of MADDIE.  We did get along great.  I checked with him to get questions answered concerning self publishing.  After all the research I did concerning publishing, the do’s and the don’ts, the process of querying agents, to have them maybe or maybe not eventually sell your book, I decided on the newest craze of Self Publishing!  Literally Self published, as in my case with the help of Smashwords.com 

It was entirely FREE!!  Did not cost me a cent.  I read Mark Coker’s book to figure out how to format the book and get it ready to download it.  Downloaded it!  Whaa Laaa, it’s published. 

As with any author and their first book, I am an unknown quantity!  Until somebody reads my work and decides that it is worth something I will remain an unknown quantity.  I am now a published e-book author, I believe we are referred to as Indie Authors! 

I have been published since January 2011.  I do believe now I may have rushed to published my first Novel, but am feverishly working on correcting that mistake with my second novel.  It will be much more polished and professional than the first. 

So far my book is selling, getting great reviews, four out of five stars consistently!  Not bad for my first book and full of typo’s, errors, and all the other mistakes I made over and over again.  My first novel “Whisper” was the weakest of the of the stories I plan on writing, I choose it to do first because I knew being my first book it would always be my worst. 

I have a blog http://thomaswilsonstoryteller.blogspot.com/ where I explain about my journey of discovery as a newly published Indie Author, among other things.  I am in the final stages of re writing and editing my second novel, and plan to publish it in September 2011.  I can’t wait to see what a much better story, much more professionally done is going to do sales wise compared to my first one.  I may check into getting an agent, and possibly even traditionally published much further down the line once I am an established author, with a fan base and following.  In the mean time I am doing great.  I don’t believe I will be needing your services or the services of a publisher at this time in my career.  Thank you though for your concern and contacting me about your self-publishing services.

My first book is available for FREE at Smashwords only for the month of JULY.  Don’t worry I am getting sales and royalties from the other avenues where my book is for sale.  Please check it out.  http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/38922

I do want to thank Mark Coker, the creator of Smashwords for his wonderful site, James Rollins (Author extraordinaire) for inspiration, My Literary Angel - friend - and Editor  - Jo Murphey!!

Most especially Jo, she has so patiently taught me so much about writing correctly, patiently corrects the same mistakes repeatedly until it gets through my thick skull and my typing too fast.  She has taken me from a want to be writer with good stories to a really good author with much better stories.  I can't even explain how much she has done for me in the last six months.  She has taught me to read with a critical eye, to the point I even caught at least one mistake in Mr. Rollins latest book, but I won't say where.  That taught me we are all human.  We all make mistakes and all have room for improvement. 

If you do not have a good editor and you desire to be a writer - STOP what your doing and find one, or put the pencil in the other hole.  Those of you who have been following along will get that reference, God only knows what the others will think.

Failure and Inspiration

At http://io9.com/5818006/10-classic-sf-and-fantasy-books-that-were-originally-considered-failures
check out the last book on the list.

The Fellowship of the Ring!  J.R.R. Tolkien!!  Originally believed to be a failure! 

If we could all fail as wonderfully as this!!! 

I only posted this to let those who are starting out and checking the web site their book is on and seeing the royalties due that are still at 7.99 of maybe less, take heart, not everything that doesn't soar off the launch pad is bad.  Some of the greats started out small and slow to start also.  Every writer everywhere had a first book and not everyone of them was a instant success.

Thank You Dreamers Perch

Thank You Cindy Borgne, and your Blog "Dreamers Perch" for the Posting this weekend of the interview of me and the excerpt of my book. 

By the way I love the Title of of Blog!!!

For any of you that missed it, Cindy's Blog did an interview of me, and included a Excerpt from Whisper my first Novel.  It is part of Smashwords Summer / Winter Promotion and being offered for FREE at Smashwords ONLY for the Month of JULY.

If you haven't read it and want to now is the time and Smashwords is the place with the right price!!
FREE FREE FREE  - It doesn't get any cheaper than that. 

The Fourth is over and everybody in my family still has all their fingers so it was a Good Celebration.
Happy Birthday America!! 

I have a question for any body who is in Great Britain and may read my Post,
How does Great Britain view America celebrating it's Independence? 
Do they for the most part "Yeah Good for them!"
   "They wouldn't be a country if it wasn't for us in the first place!"
       "The unruly colonist's who revolted!"
           "Our former colony, now wonderful allies!"
 Just curious???

Sunday, July 3, 2011

New Inerview and Excerpt of Whisper

Today a excellent website has provided a Excerpt from my first Novel and an Interview of Me!!!!

Please check it out!!  http://tiny.ly/b6nc

Also if your interested in reading it - My First Novel - "Whisper"
It is FREE during the month of July at Smashwords dot com
http://www.Smashwords.com/books/view/38922

Still finishing my second Novel "No Rules Of Engagement" due out in two months!!

Friday, July 1, 2011

Smashwords Summer/Winter Promotion

For the month of July the web site Smashwords is having a Summer - Winter Promotion !

It's Summer in the Northern Hemisphere and Winter in the Southern Hemisphere, so they are offering books to read in at the beach while on vacation or snuggle up to a fire with. 

I am participating in the promotion and as my book was already priced at .99 Cents, because I am virtually an un-known author, the only place to go down to was zero.  So during the month of July my book.  My first Novel!  Will be available for free through Smashwords dot com. 

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/38922  If you have not read it yet, what a perfect time to get it, because it can't get any cheaper than this!! 

Just a note I am in the final stages with my second Novel, "No Rules Of Engagement".  We are still on track to E-Publish it September 11th. 

 
Design by Wordpress Theme | Bloggerized by Free Blogger Templates | coupon codes