Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Wondorus Web Worlds Vol. 4 on sale


Sam's Dot Publishing has placed Wondrous Web Worlds Vol. 4 on sale through The Genre Mall. You can order it for $10 with no shipping & handling, but the sale only lasts through the end of September.

For those of you that are new readers of this blog, the Wondrous Web Worlds anthologies are the best of the web collections that Sam's Dot puts out each year. They feature the best poems and stories from Sam's Dot's on-line zines, as voted on by the readers. This is an anthology that I edit, but in this particular issue, there is also a story from me..."Lost in the Dark."

You can read a complete write-up of the anthology, and of course order copies by going to http://www.genremall.com/anthologiesr.htm#www4.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Red Moon Rising release date

The original plan had been to try to get this book out by MileHiCon, which is in less than eight weeks, but with last minute edits, and changes to the Sam's Dot Publishing schedule, that's just not doable, and I'm ok with that. I'd rather they put out the best version of the book that they can, as opposed to rushing the book.

So, the official release date for Red Moon Rising will be February 1st, 2011. I'll be bringing you more details about the book as we get closer to the release date.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Another Dr.'s appointment and a baby shower

We went to another Dr.'s appointment yesterday. Rebecca had to do the glucose test for gestational diabetes, and I know any woman who is reading this and has had to go through this just gagged. Everything is still looking good, although when the Dr. went to do the Doppler test so we could hear the heartbeat, our overly active little spaz of a child kicked the Doppler. It had us all laughing.

Today is the baby shower. Luckily it's not going to be a typical baby shower. It's just going to be a bunch of people sitting down and eating together. I don't think either of us could have put up with all of the ridiculous shower games...

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Just Because

A few years ago, Sam's Dot Publishing released a trade paperback that I edited called Just Because. This book was a collection of poems, essays, and stories by ProMart founder James Baker. For those of you that don't recognize the name, Jim, and his little publishing house ProMart, were responsible for helping a lot of writers get their careers started...including me. ProMart even published the works of a future Hugo nominee...so Jim obviously had an eye for talent.

I'd been editing for a while for Jim when he sent me a story by an unpublished author by the name of Tyree Campbell. This would be the first of many stories we would publish by Tyree, and when Jim was stricken with cancer, and we knew he wouldn't make it, it was Tyree who stepped up and took over the company...creating Sam's Dot Publishing.

After Jim's untimely death, I put together this anthology, and we released it as a trade paperback. Now Nomadic Delirium Press (the publisher I now run) has released the book as an e-book. You can get a chance to read some of Jim's works, and maybe get a sense of who he was. The book is also peppered with commentary from the people who knew him best...his ProMartians, as he called us...

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/21599

Friday, August 13, 2010

Time flies...or does it?

I'm still having trouble believing that the oldest started the fourth grade last week. Even harder to believe is that the youngest (soon to be middle) started kindergarten. It seems like they didn't even have a summer vacation.

Next Saturday (the 21st) will be our baby shower. This also will mark our three month anniversary. It's hard to believe that we've been married for three months. It seems like we just said, "I do."

At the same time, however, tomorrow marks the start of the third trimester for our next little nerd, which means we still have 12 weeks until the due date. It seems like Rebecca has been pregnant for almost a year, and I'm sure it seems even more so to her...given how sick she has been through this whole pregnancy.

So, is time flying, or is it dragging? I really have no idea...

Saturday, August 07, 2010

Respect your editors and publishers

I've been working as an editor for more than a decade now, and there are some behaviors I've seen from writers that I consider disgusting. I'm not talking about not following guidelines, although that happens a lot. I've never edited anything that accepts horror, and yet I'm constantly inundated by it. I'm talking about things like sending nasty letters to an editor after they've rejected your work, trying to sell reprints as originals, slandering editors or publishers because they didn't want to accept your work, and anything else that might be similar.

It might seem hard to believe that writers can act this way, but they can, and believe me, they do! I used to comment on every piece I rejected, but at least once or twice a month I'd get a nasty e-mail back from a disgruntled author, and because of that, I rarely comment on author's work anymore, and that's a bad thing for authors. Feedback from an editor can be a real help to an aspiring writer, but because of a few childish people, fewer and fewer editors are giving feedback anymore.

In a sense, editors and publishers are something like a writer's employers and they should be treated as such. Most people aren't going to call their boss a jerk because their boss wasn't happy with their performance, but since the internet isn't face to face, people seem to have a lot more courage to act like fools.

One thing that writers don't seem to realize is that editors talk to one another, and if someone is misbehaving, there's a good chance that other editors will find out. If your work is rejected, and you're not happy with the rejection, then feel free to write a nasty rant to the publisher...but DON'T SEND IT!!!

Never try to sell first rights to a story that has already been published. It's simply a form of dishonesty, and no one likes dishonest people, plus when you get caught, a lot of other editors will find out, and it could end your career.

And whatever you do, don't go around posting nasty things about editors or publishers because they've rejected your work. You look foolish when you do it, and there's a good chance that other publishers and editors will read your rants, and they'll be much less likely to want to work with you...

Thursday, August 05, 2010

The Genre Mall

As many of you may know, I run an on-line "store" for small press genre titles. The site is called The Genre Mall and it has been around for quite a few years.

Traffic and sales have been increasing at the site, and I'm working on ways to try to maximize this. The most obvious reason for doing this is that I've been looking for a "real" job for a while, and haven't had any luck, so we need any extra income we can get.

We're using three different approaches to try to increase income from The Genre Mall. The first, and most obvious, is that we've added donation buttons to a number of the pages. I've heard mixed reviews on taking donations from a wide variety of genre sites, so we'll see how this goes.

The second thing we're doing is contacting the publishers that have been with us for a while that we haven't had any recent updates from. We're hoping that they'll decide to stay with The Genre Mall, and that they'll have a lot of new titles to add.

The third thing we'll be doing is making a big push to sign up some more publishers.

All of this is a lot of work, and it really needs to pay off, or we may be forced to pull the plug because I can't invest a lot of time in something that doesn't pay off if I should happen to find a real job.

If all of this does pay off, then I'm hoping to make some changes to the site...mostly cleaning it up, and if it pays off big enough than I'm planning on setting up some kind of store front, because the current site is just too clunky right now, and I haven't been happy with it for quite some time...

Monday, August 02, 2010

A busy few weeks ahead of us

The next few weeks are going to be quite crazy around here. In addition to Rebecca working her usual hours, and me trying to find a job at the same time that I'm writing, editing, and doing game design, we have a lot of other things on our calendar.

Tuesday we're taking a tour of the hospital where the baby is going to be born. Immediately after that, we're going to back to school night at the girls' school. On Wednesday the oldest starts the 4th grade, and then the next Wednesday, the youngest starts Kindergarten (Where does the time go?)

At Rebecca's work, they're getting ready to do inventory, which means there's a lot for her to do, and she may even pick up a few extra hours if she can handle it. We certainly need the money, but I'm worried about her pushing herself to hard. Their official inventory date is the 19th. The day after that, we have a doctor's appointment, and this is for the glucose test, which I know any woman who has ever had a baby knows exactly what I'm talking about. Then on the 21st, we have a baby shower that one of Rebecca's friends has put together for her.

So, it will be a crazy few weeks...let's hope we make it through with whatever is left of our sanity...