Beginning and Endings

Tonight, August 30, 2011, God willing, because Lord I need your help, and blessings, I am going to download my second Novel on Amazon, Smashwords, and CreateSpace.

CreateSpace may have to wait for another night, depending if I have to cut and paste the entire document into their preformatted templates.

I was planning all along to wait until September 11, 2011; because that is the target date my Editor and I agreed upon to get everything finished by.  We did it, except for piecing together the pieces that you have to put together when you download it.  It is done, finished.  In three different formats for three different platforms.  This will be my second book, but my first time adding a book to my existing accounts, so it is still new and unfamiliar territory.

I still remember when not so long ago I was still saying, "One of these days I 'm going to write a book."  I still don't really believe I finished two.  There were times when I didn't think I would ever finish writing the first rough draft.  Times through the process when I didn't think my Editor and I would finish the editing, the rewriting, the re-editing.  I am going to publish them early, nobody but the very few who follow my blog will know they are out there early.  So those of you who are interested can get a jump on everybody else as a bonus for following along with my Blog Posts.  I figure why wait or mess with them if they happen to make it through the review process at the different sites.  I am still very unknown, and a very early in my limited writing career.  So a big release date doesn't really matter at this point.

I do want to thank J.L. Murphey, Jo to me, My literary angel and editor, for her extreme patience with my impatience and my horrific English skills.  Some of the rules of English took me a while to get a grasp of and I realize I still have a long road to go.  Without Jo's continued help, support, guidance, counseling, and friendship I would never have gotten this far.  She has put in countless hours for FREE, out of the goodness of her heart to help a fellow human being become something else, and accomplish their dream.  I can never say enough or do enough to repay you.  All Jo has asked is that I pass it on.  Angelic!!

I have begun writing the sequels to both books and am biting at the bit to continue.  So tonight it is farewell to "No Rules Of Engagement" and it will be sent out into that giant virtual library slash book store of the world.  The nice thing about sequels is the characters continue on, growing as characters as the writer grows also.  I will strive to make each sequel better than the first book of the series.  Continue on learning my craft.

I have purchased a Digital Drawing pad to hook to my computer.  I happen to be quite the accomplished artist, not that one can tell by my book covers.  I will split my time learning to transfer my real artistic ability into a digital format by learning how to manipulate the programs and use a digital brush instead of a real brush and paint.  Hopefully later on I can have better illustrations in my books, and much better book covers.  At some point I will endeavor to take photographs of some of my paintings and post them in a post here.

I have a nugget of writing advice to pass on that I have learned recently.  As I began writing the sequels I was going slow and trying my best to not make the mistakes I made in my previous two books in regards to my English skills.  When I read somewhere that a very talented and successful author said to write like a whirl wind and get the ideas down.  He said he has lost probably ten novels and other ones didn't come out as good as they could have because he was going slow and trying to write better.  He said get it down before you lose it.  Later you can be artistic, poetic and an eloquent writer as you're rewriting it.  You are going to re-write it.  Some parts numerous times!  Then you're going to edit until you want to gouge your eyes out with a pencil, and it's so much fun!  It's worth it in the end, when you have a book you are extremely proud to call yours.  This nugget is free and your reward for reading this through to the end.

I thank my follows of this blog for staying with me through this scary, exciting, growing, challenging time in my life and career.

A factual tidbit, concerning "No Rules Of Engagement", the actual birth date for the main character, Alexander Hawk, a troubled orphan, would be September 11, 2011.  That's why we planned that day as a target to finish.  The book is set in the not too distant future, and in a part of the book Alexander turns nine.  I backed up nine years to figure out when his actual birthday would be and it would be 09/11/11.  When I realized this I got a hold of Jo and asked her if she thought we could finish by then.  It's just an interesting tidbit about the book.

Posted in: No Rules Of Engagement Writing Publishing