All posts tagged ebooks and paperbacks

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


Last week, after a kick in the pants from the workshop I’m taking, I managed over 12K and finished whatever I was working on, despite not writing every day. This week I’ll try for a short story and then we’ll see. Maybe two short stories if I manage to keep the wordcount high! I mean, I do want to reach pulp speed (i.e.1million words per year), so I better start worning on it! 😉

I got the email from KDP that they’re raising the paperback prices. With hundreds of books to update, I will take advantage of their bulk update, but not until mid-June, so if you’re a paperback lover, go grab ’em now! Other authors who have already sent the bulk update mentioned it takes time, but just to be safe, order now.

I ordered some paperbacks myself for future comic con, since they will cost more for me as well! They’re mostly in Italian, since I don’t plan on going anywhere this year. Worldcon is in China, and since I didn’t make it to Chicago, which I love, imagine if I want to embark on a trip to China! 😉 Next year it’s in Glasgow, so we’ll see…

Speaking of Worldcons, I finally read a paperback that I got from the author at Loncon 2014… yeah, I’m ashamed to admit that’s how much it took me to get to reading it. And since he’s not on Bookbub, but he’s a Goodreads friend, here’s the link to his book (although I have a different cover).

Do I recommend it? Yes, if you like historical time travel! I read the short story back then, so I don’t remember it at all (it’s still on K.K. though), therefore it was totally new and rather interesting. I mean, historical time travel and alternate history, what’s not to love? Check it out!

I see he has written other books since, although we haven’t been in touch… but my TBR pile is still quite high, so I’ll have to postpone checking them! I might go back to reading on Kindle soon, still plenty of Kickstarter books to read, sigh!

Above it’s Peter&Barb at Loncon 2014, and yes, he’s holding the book he gave me (and I’m holding my copy of Star Minds the Trilogy)… While looking for that picture in the dashboard, I cleaned up the old posts – mostly of my own drawings, all the guest posts still have images – to get more space in the media library… And that’s all for today! Have a great week!

Advertisement
4 Comments
by Barb on 24/05/2023  •  Permalink
Posted in reading, real world inspiration
Tagged , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 24/05/2023

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2023/05/24/wednesday-weekly-roundup-189/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


Last week I wrote over 13K, which means by now I have reached 500K, yay! I wasn’t hoping to reach the goal this year, honestly, so I’m glad I did. Anything I write in the next four week it’s bonus words! 🙂

Not as good as past years, but I’m not complaining. And here’s a picture of all the books published this year in English (and yes, all have the paperback version)!

I don’t have plans for the new year yet. I hope to wrap up the current project this week, then we’ll see. I’m waiting for feedback on a story that I submitted, if it’s rejected, I’m going to write the novel for that one. Or maybe I’ll write a batch of shorts so that in 2024 I can do a Make 100 Kickstarter. I don’t have enough stories to do it in January 2023 yet.

Yes, I have a lot of shorts, but I wanted to do a volume of original, never-published-before stories, and I don’t have enough of those yet. So I’m going to write a few more, and see if I can fill those gaps. I also still have a couple of stories under consideration at traditional mags, and won’t hear about them until the end of January, so it’s definitely not for this year.

I have almost finished the shorter works on the New Kindle (which I won’t bother review or recommend), so I will start a new novel soon. I still have to pick a genre, though (yes, they’re mostly SFF, but it varies from space opera to urban fantasy to paranormal to whatever, so I’ll have to decide what to read next).

Hope the digital TBR list goes down by half at the end of the year, but I doubt I can do it! 😉 Here’s to wishing you happy reading, writing and mostly, have a great week!

by Barb on 07/12/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, real world inspiration, writing projects
Tagged , , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 07/12/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/12/07/wednesday-weekly-roundup-165/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


And the last title of the year is out! This collection of shorter stories can be read independently from the novels, but don’t skip the short prologue! 😀 The series is complete, although there might be more Immortaland books in the future – with less dragons, though.

So the next books will be in the same world but slightly different, like in the Star Minds Universe where there’s a “main series” and then the Lone Wolves. Definitely next year, though! 🙂

Last week I wrote 10K, including the last story for the workshops which might be incorporated in a novel attached to an existing series but standalone. So I might also reprise a couple of series next year. All fantasy for now – taking a break from space opera until the muse strikes!

The Happiness Is… on Instagram will end January 1st, so I don’t know what will happen to that account next. I don’t have any other strips or vignettes ready, nor the inspiration to draw more just yet, so we’ll see. Some say it’s the slow death of social media, but you can always come here to get news from yours truly.

This blog isn’t going away yet, even if it’s so 2010s. I’m considering making the newsletter montly instead of bimonthly, so I’ll send out a survey in the next newsletter to ask what people think. You can still sign up here, and next newsletter is probably going to be the last one with a free story, since only one person has bothered to download them so far.

In other news, I finally started using the new Kindle and added to it all the books I got from Kickstarters and bundles in the past year… I already sorely miss K.K. but it no longer supported the Kindle Store and I couldn’t add anything to it anymore. Sigh.

And that’s all for today! Have a great week! 😀

by Barb on 23/11/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, reading, real world inspiration
Tagged , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 23/11/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/11/23/wednesday-weekly-roundup-163/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


And Book 5 is out! The novels are over, and the last one (above) has dragon eggs and dragon cubs in it. Next title is a collection of shorts related to the novels or prequels to the novels, but it can also be read independently, I guess… you’ll see in a couple of weeks!

And since Facebook/Meta is making things harder for Pages, as soon as this series is all out, I’ll probably stop updating the author Page. I’ll put back the generic cover picture and let this blog go there automatically, but I probably won’t be updating the photo albums much longer.

I feel the social media in question is very close to the Thrust Termocline, and to understand what I mean, check out this Twitter thread. Social media aren’t the only companies doing this, and a certain retailer apparently is making lots of customers unhappy with their latest changes, so we’ll see.

I don’t have an alternate social media platform yet, although I may eventually go back to Patreon or try Substack, but that’s something to think about next year.

Last week I was supposed to go back to work on Nov.2, but I woke up with a fever, slept it off, and then tested positive for Covid, so I spent the rest of the week at home. I managed to write almost 13k (as soon as the fever left me the next day), or two stories, one in Italian, the other in English, which brought the yearly total to 455K. I may still make it to 500K if I find a novel-length project to finish the year.

I’m probably going for an English social sci-fi story with genetic manipulation, sort of mirror (well, actually, it’s more like a sequel) to the Italian novel, so I can explore more of this strange alternate future. If I can figure out how to do bilingual books, it might all come under the same umbrella, otherwise, we’ll see. It’s rather complicated, since the stories in the two languages aren’t translations, but different stories in the same late 21st century Earth (different countries, different points of view), so… I don’t know yet what will be.

Another post that stroke a chord with me is Kris Rusch’s Building a New World. Here’s to me being able to drop that part-time DayJob (that will hopefully soon vanish or be automated or whatever else the powers that be have in mind for that sort of thing), since I’m nearing 60, and that’s when you no longer take shit from anyone, LOL!

That’s all for today! Have a great week! 🙂

by Barb on 09/11/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, writing projects
Tagged , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 09/11/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/11/09/wednesday-weekly-roundup-161/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


And here comes Book 4 of Immortaland Dragons! Dragon Queen is out in eBook and paperback! 🙂 In two weeks comes Book 5 and then the final collection and the series will be complete!

Last week I wrote 16.5K words, which took the yearly wordcount to 430K, which is not bad at all, even if it’s much lower than the previous two-three years. 6K were in English, 10.5K were in Italian, still working on that social sci-fi novel. The short story in English will probably come out next year anyway, possibly as a prequel or included in a collection in a pre-existing series.

This week I’m traveling, but I have the writing computer with me, so I should be able to finish that Italian novel and send it to betas. I’m meeting friends as well, so some social life for a change. And when I get back I hope Techie Bro takes the laptop away for some necessary work.

That’s all for today! Can’t believe October is almost over already… Have a great week! 🙂

by Barb on 26/10/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, writing projects
Tagged , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 26/10/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/10/26/wednesday-weekly-roundup-159/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


In case you missed it from the publisher’s page, the rebranding is done. My old laptop refuses to run any kind of graphics program (Photoshop, Gimp) because some Windows update clashes with it, so I installed Photoshop on the writing netbook – which only allows me to work on covers, but it will have to do for now.

No digital drawings in the near future, or new strips or anything like that for now, but I can still play with covers. Here are the latest new babies (except the last one):

Last week I started going through the new project and making changes, since it’s the first read-through after finishing all four books and sending them to Mighty Editor. I’m also writing the related stories, so I need to tweak things here and there. And I ended up with almost 9K new words, yay!

I hope this week will be less hectic at work (last week I went to work only 2 days out of 5 because of Covid-positive colleagues), then I’ll have a week off to celebrate my dad’s 90th birthday (eaten by mosquitos in Tuscany, LOL!). Hope it’s not too hot on your side of the world (or cold if you’re down under) and have a great week!

by Barb on 20/07/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, real world inspiration
Tagged , , ,

Posted by Barb on 20/07/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/07/20/wednesday-weekly-roundup-145/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


Last week I wrote 18K, which means that this week I hit 250K, so halfway through my prospected wordcount, and there’s still room to go farther. Even if I was not planning to, or taking it easy, I might end up with 500K new words at the end of the year, after all! 🙂

I’m back to the DayJob this week, so maybe I’ll write less. Monday was hectic, and I put down very few words. And I have to update another series as well, ebook and paperback blurbs included, and here’s a sneak peek of the new covers:

A nice guide for audio book authors and Finding the Highest Paid Royalties for Your Audiobooks. I probably won’t make any more audio books, since the Findaway Reports are depressing, LOL! I won’t even listen to the audio books I got through a couple of Kickstarters, but well… it’s just me! 🙂

Last week the bimonthly newsletter went out with a surprise: a free story. I will probably add one from now on, since I’ve become proficient using Book Funnel for delivery! 😉 So if you want a free story every two months, subscribe to the publisher’s site. Next UPB Newsletter is due out on August 1st.

The heat has unfortunately hit this damn town, so I’m going to start my summer hybernation soon… Although the house is still relatively cool, so if I don’t reach it half melted by the 35°C I get while waiting the bus, I’ll probably be able to do something.

I mean writing and all that stuff I mention above. Maybe! 😀 Oh, and don’t forget the clock is ticking on the Visions of the Future bundle… Or you can try the 2022 Pride Bundle, and the Twisted Fairy Tales might already be over when you read this!

I guess that’s all for today! Have a great week! 🙂

by Barb on 08/06/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, real world inspiration
Tagged , , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 08/06/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/06/08/wednesday-weekly-roundup-139/

Sunday Surprise


Kalicalypse brings together recent stories of talented SF writers from Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh and India, widening the scope of the previous Future Fiction volume Avatar.

The stories deal with crucial issues for understanding the development of the subcontinent and therefore of a large slice of the world population: fascinating and disturbing visions at the same time, such as the ethics of mind-uploading in an aging population, the exploitation of mythic archetypes in VR by the powerful Shiva corporation, the biopolitics of fertility for which a daughter that bleeds becomes a valuable asset in The Fertile Market, the migration of climate change refugees to Edge-of-Space platforms, the terraforming by nanobots for the amelioration of the Earth, and the challenges facing those who are operating junk-ships in space.

“Speculative thinking underlies all gestures of critical thought. What lies at the other side of the Kalicalypse? Many new worlds? Kalicalypse is the plurality we inhabit.” – Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay

Table of Contents

Introduction by Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay

The New Humans by Trishna Basak

Kali_Na by Indrapramit Das

The Art of Possible by Yudhanjaya Wijeratne

The Daughter That Bleeds by Shweta Taneja

The New Migrants by Navin Weeraratne

Anamnesis by Rupsa Dey

The Architecture of Loss by Salik Shah

Tethered by Haris Durrani

Steeling Minds by Kehkashan Khalid

The Almighty by Zafar Iqbal

Afterword by Tarun Saint

Translations from Bengali by Arunava Sinha

Cover art by Paolo Castelluccio

Available from June 2022 in paperback and ebook in dual language English and Italian.

by Barb on 05/06/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in Guest Post, reading
Tagged , , ,

Posted by Barb on 05/06/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/06/05/sunday-surprise-281/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


Two more older titles had a face-lift – new cover, new blurb – please, check them out! Lost in the Milky Way (formerly known as Yash&Ryo Lost in the Milky Way) and Soul Thieves are now gone from Smashwords as well, until they manage that actual merging with D2D, that is.

Last week was my most prolific of the year with 25K written, but then, I was off DayJob. It’s also a personal record, the previous one being 21K/week! Whenever I’ll manage to be a full-time writer, how much more will I be able to write? 😉

Although again it’s a series of novels… my wordcount drops dramatically when I write short stories, because of the day-break between projects. If I write a 40K short novel, I’m putting down more words in a month than if I write four 10K stories.

There will be a series of shorts when I finish these novels, but they’re all mostly connected, so I should be able to write them quickly. My poor editor doesn’t know what’s coming for her in June, LOL!

Now, about that Kickstarter… my author copies arrived, and I realized that one book has a cream interior, the others white. Teaches me not to check when I publish the rest after four years, but then… Future Earth Chronicles anyone? 😉

For whoever came late to the party, in Future Earth Chronicles, the paperbacks have alternatively white and cream interior because I screwed up with the first two… For Otherside I realized my mistake when I received my copies, so we have a vintage-looking first book and brand new ones! 😀

Otherside paperbacks

There is still time to get Visions of the Future bundle and get all those awesome sci-fi ebooks for a ridicusly low price. Check it out, and if sci-fi is not your cup of tea, share with friends, in case someone is interested! 🙂

Now I shall get back to writing… and working on that non-writerly stuff… and Friday I’m back to DayJob, sigh! Have a great week! 🙂

by Barb on 01/06/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, the Human being, writing exercise, writing projects
Tagged , , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 01/06/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/06/01/wednesday-weekly-roundup-138/

Wednesday Weekly Roundup


And the last title being out, the series is now complete, and the series page updated with all the links! The paperbacks should be on their way to the backers who requested them. So I guess this Kickstarter is done! 🙂

Now I should be able to announce the second rebranding for the Star Minds Universe, and here you can see the new covers! There’s also new blurbs, if you’d like to check them out. The series page is updated too.

The titles are slightly changed, but the stories inside are the same – well, a couple of volumes have a new title, because “Interregnum” didn’t make sense anymore, so I changed it to “Confederation”. And you also get a sneak peek of the book coming in July! 🙂

The Smashwords/D2D merging means the books will vanish from Smashwords for a few months, they still have no idea when they’ll be able to send titles to the Smashwords store, but since my only Smashwords customer already has them, I don’t think they will be missed! 😉

Also, the slightly different title means I had to let go the Createspace paperbacks and make a new edition with a new ISBN on KDPprint. I didn’t change the art on the paperbacks, only the typography and the blurbs, but since the title is locked to the ISBN, I decided to create a new edition. Same interior, though! 😀

I wrote almost 13K on the new project last week. I hope to get that much done this week, but this rebranding will keep me busy as well. It’s not only the Star Minds Universe getting a face lift! I did mention I need to tackle Silvery Earth as well at some point, and I’m already starting experiments, but I probably won’t be able to do all the books until the summer.

Meanwhile I take care of the rest! 😀 And write the next book, of course! On TikTok I posted a couple of WiP videos, with things that won’t end up in the final book, like maps… but they’re useful when your characters wander a lot like mine! 🙂

The strip is over on Instagram, so from Sunday you can check the Happiness is… vignettes there. Yes, truly, I’m getting rid of Da Muses, how cruel can I be? 😉 I’m finding other ways to inspire myself, I did change the way I write my books through the decades, so I’ll be fine…

The next big news might be a Sunday Surprise! Have a great week! 😀

by Barb on 25/05/2022  •  Permalink
Posted in indie publishing, real world inspiration, the Human being
Tagged , , , , , ,

Posted by Barb on 25/05/2022

https://creativebarbwire.wordpress.com/2022/05/25/wednesday-weekly-roundup-137/

« Older Posts
%d bloggers like this: