Tag: EDITOR

Unknown Place, Unknown Galaxy

If you are wondering why I have been so quiet it’s because I have started tentative work on the follow-up volume to Too Bright the Sun (which I am still waiting for a female reader to have a go at before I start the editing process).

I have tried a very different kind of opening to anything I have tried before. It’s a strange kind of hook if it is a hook at all but as they say, rules are there to be broken and a I have heard it said that not one rule in writing has not been broken at least once successfully.

Also today I saw an article on slashdot about selling kindle E-books for 99 cents and how this is the trick that earned one author over 350K dollars since 1 January. The article has some big inaccuracies though so I have commented on these and offered some thoughts of my own. I am posting under the username Kite43:
https://news.slashdot.org/story/11/03/09/0618234/Crime-Writer-Makes-a-Killing-With-99-Cent-E-Books#comments

Too Bright the Sun – Illustrations

My third reader to finish the draft novel has commented that he thinks it would be nice to have a few pages of illustrations of the various vehicles, guns and devices in the book and I must say I think it’s a good idea. More value for the reader. I might have a go myself.

Anyway looking for illustrations (would need to black and white although there is space for 1 colour illustration on rear cover) of:

MCS (both versions Mark 6 and 7)
J5 (Standford Torus Space Station)
X.50 laser
X.77 short-range laser (X.77 is equivalent of an Uzi – short barrel, no stock, optional second handle). Both this and X.50 would have the Trion logo on the side
Alien ‘Clover-leaf’ laser
IM truck
SU 401 Attack Fighter

All-comers welcome

IM Alien ‘Clover-leaf Laser’ by El’Phantasmo

Making Savage Cuts as an Editor

Well, I have had to savage my own book – not by reviews but by cutting. The other night I had had enough of the younger readers complaining that the first 2 chapters were a bit slow so I took an axe to it and cut from 40,000 words down to just 25,000. Gone are some of my beloved sections on Bulgaria and the second world war and the childhood and wartime romances are reduced to just one line. Now the story starts with the murder of the main protagonist’s daughter. It seems a bit weird reading it back, stripped-down as it is but I think once I get used to it, it will probably be better. It certainly has producing some interesting effects. A reverie now lasts more than one chapter – unusual, but I am sure there are precedents.

Ah well, the main problem is the people who have already bought it. I have offered to send manuscripts of the new, shorter chapters to them. I also pointed out that they have read the Extended Version of the first Edition. I am also considering doing a different cover for the Kindle version.