What if Star Wars was your Ex-girlfriend?

Star Wars (Episode IV): The 1st Date

OMG. She's amazing. She like drives super fast spaceships, she wields swords made of light, she's adventurous and yeah, she whines a bit about her farm background and "getting off this boring" planet, but everything she says and does is so new and exciting. I love her wild hair! She's the type who shoots first. She even makes getting her trash compactor fixed sound sooo interesting. And at the end of the meal: Wow! Wow! Wow! Everything just explodes and she gives me a "First Date" medal. I am totally going to see her again.

The Empire Strikes Back (Episode VI): The 2nd Date

All the potential of the first date is realized and then some! She is deeper and more interesting than I thought. She likes snow vacations, but would dive into a swamp for adventure (heck she even once scooped out the innards of a large animal to survive the cold--now that's hard core). She knows even more groovy zen things and martial arts. Yeah, she has some father issues, but that just makes her sooo much more interesting. When the date ends it feels unfinished. She just leaves me wanting more. I HAVE to see her again. We are SO going to go steady. We might even get married.

The Return of the Jedi (Episode VII): The 3rd Date

It starts off like the first date all over again. Excitement! Action! She rescues the conversation when some rather sizeable fellow stumbles into our table. Then things get a little weird. Her friend who she almost dated is really her brother. She spends the last twenty minutes of the date talking about her cute stuffed pets and concocts an unbelievable story about how they could take on an army and win. Yeah right! But then things explode with excitement (again) at the end of the date--alas it's not as cool as last time. She still looks great though. I'm sure that was just a lull. I'm gonna move in with her.

The Phantom Menace (Episode 1): Going Steady

Okay. We're living together. Finally! It's been a long wait. But then she starts talking about politics and trade taxation and everyone she mentions has a hard to remember name. And she buys about ten thousand of those robot vacuum cleaners and makes them fight each other. Boring! Then her cousin, JJB, keeps hanging out at our apartment. I can't understand a word he says. Like who invited him? She gets a little spacey at times and talks more Taoist philosophy and about the virgin birth of her father. Huh? I tell myself be patient. Every relationship has its rough patch.

Attack of the Clones (Episode 2): The What? Moment

It's really hard to remember that first date now. We just sit at home in our apartment in our sweats. She's still talking and talking about politics and voting and clones and plots against her life ...you know I can't pay attention. The robot vacuums fight each other again. At least her cousin isn't hanging around. She just can't stop talking about her dad having to marry her mom in secret. It would be interesting if I wasn't already so bored. I'm starting to look at other women...there's a cute one with pointed ears who catches my eye. I don't do anything about it, though.

Revenge of the Sith (Episode 3): The Breakup

I am so tired of hearing about her past. It's completely, mind-numbingly boring. I think she's joining a republic. Apparently her dad didn't get some promotion he wanted and he went all wacko. What a suck! I look at her and think: can't we just go on one more high speed chase in space? Please? Or swing across a chasm with stormtroopers shooting at us? But no, she is so full of angst and hatred. I guess her mom died giving birth to her. Sad. She starts wearing black armour. At first, I thought, "kinky." But now it just freaks me out...plus she has a bit of a skin condition and all her hair falls out. And she rasps everything she says. Everything. I move out. I'm never coming back. Ever. I don't see her for years and years.

Then I hear that she changed her hairstylist and she wants to get back in touch with me. Yeah, sure. Maybe I'll see you again, darling--just don't bring your cousin.

Arthur Slade is the author of seventeen bestselling novels for young adults and the soon-to-be released graphic novel Modo: Ember's End

Whoa! Two Years of Selling Ebooks!

What? Where did those two years go? Back in February 5th of 2011 I launched my novel DUST as an ebook (for sale in the US and UK, because those are the countries where I owned the rights myself).

Those were heady days! But I've blogged about them on previous occasions, so I won't retread that ground. Just start reading from the  beginning or skip ahead to the amazing 1 1/2 year report.

Well not much has changed in the last six months. Overall I've sold 8406 copies of my ebooks. Last year that grossed me  around $6000. That's like sixty iPods! I could wear them as an iPod suit. Anyway, I expect my ebook income to drop this year. Why? Because as I've noted before there has been a downward trend in my sales since my last report. Here's an amazing graphic to show that...

Hey, that number in the bottom keeps going down each month. 249 copies seven months ago. 53 copies sold last month. I do think there is much more competition out there now and that there was a big blitz on sales while everyone and their pet got an eReader then filled it up. And the drop in sales is also because of the algorithmic changes Amazon made to how they weight the price of books on the sales chart (if you sell a 9.99 book, it'll jump higher up the sales chart than a .99 cent book). It became harder for my books to climb the charts and get noticed by buyers.

Yet, I'm happy with the sales.  It's still passive income for me that will go on as long as there are eReaders in the world. I really don't do much extra work to earn that income. And I'm very much a less work for more money kind of guy!  Art As a public service I'll attach these clickable links to my books, including the two "grown up" books I've published under the name Stephen Shea. If a book isn't available in your area as an ebook, it's because I'm still negotiating the erights for that book. So sorry for any confusion.

1000 Words a Day or Else!

Why do I have a picture of me digging a hole in my backyard (it's for the fish pond, you DEXTER fans, it's for the fish pond)? Well, sometimes when I'm writing I feel like I'm stuck in a rut that's inside a deep hole. Or that I'm treading water without waterwings. I've found that all the other "demands" of being a writer (clever Facebook updates, amazingly insightful tweets, googling my own name) do tend to distract from my main goal of writing. So I wanted to change that. Or...to redirect my distraction.

Recently, I was re-reading Stephen King's On Writing and he mentioned that he works every day except for Christmas and his birthday. What a lazy bum! Just think about how much more he'd get done if he worked those extra days. His goal is to write 2000 words a day (thankfully, he didn't say whether or not they had to be clever, perfect words). 2000 words! I can do that easily. Just as soon as I get around to it. I have to put the finishing touches on a tweet. Oh, and check my Amazon rankings and...oh, wait...there I go again.

It suddenly occurred to me that I could do half the work of Stephen King in the same amount of time. So I set up a little goal for myself and made up my own rules. I must write 1000 words of new work every day.  Yes, new is the important part. No matter what rewriting is needed, no matter whether I have a reading at a school, a deadline or a dentist appointment, the very first thing I must do is write 1000 new words. No tweets. No checking the hockey score on my virtual hockey team (Authored Destruction). Those words must be written. All of my rewriting, redrafting, pretending to plot, are all on hold until the new words are done. The reason I want to write new words is that I do believe those brand new, sparkly words and sentences that come flowing out of your mind in that first draft are as close to the subconscious as we get as writers. And I think it's important to be in touch with your subconscious first thing in the morning (right after waking). There is a caveat to the rule. I can stockpile words. So if I'm going on a holiday, I will actually take a holiday, as long as I've written my quota for the time that I'm away. But I'm gonna work on my birthday and Christmas (take that Mr. King).

Heck, I made a splendid chart to keep track of it all. And to motivate myself. As you can see I'm ten days into my schedule and I've written 11,000 new words. I'm 1000 words ahead! And I even took last Sunday off.

I have found that the buzz I get from creating that new storyline carries on to my rewriting that I do 2nd thing in the morning. It's like jumpstarting my mind. It crackles. It sparks. Then the creative engine roars into verbtacular life.

So if you see me tweeting early in the morning you have full writes...err...rights to say, "What's up, Dude? Didja get your 1000 new words done yet?" And, I encourage you to do 1000 new a day words, too. Just think about how much brighter the world will be...

At the end of the year I hope to have 365, 000 new words to play with, to bat around, juggle and rewrite and turn into something other people might want to read. Until then I'll keep on plugging (or treadmilldesking) away...


Art

Odd Questions that Authors Get (hilarious answers free): III

AH, more questions that authors get...with perfectly rational answers. Q: Is it okay if I come to your house and watch you write? A: Is it okay if I give the FBI your address? By the way I've moved to Antarctica. Turn left when you see the marching penguins and you'll be there. Don't worry about dressing warm.

Q: Are you sensitive to bad reviews? A: No. No. No. No. No. NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

A: Oh, you're a writer? What do you do as a job? Q: Writing is easy and doesn't take much time and is really more of a hobby, so I spend the rest of my hours as a serial killer. What's your address again?

Q: What is the most fun about being a writer? A: I get to wear pajamas all day. A: My only boss is my muse. A: Playing jokes on people by naming characters after them. Like my friend Cheryl who complained that I never named any characters after her. So I invented Cheryl the Sasquatch for one of my books (true story).

Q: What is the worst thing about being a writer? A: I wear pajamas all day. Even to readings. A: My only boss is my muse but she's seven feet tall and smokes cigars and demands 20,000 words a week and bacon. How much bacon is there in the world? A: A real Sasquatch showed up one day. Her name was Cheryl. She was not happy that I turned her into a comical character. She was very good at MMSA (Mixed Martial Sasquatch Arts). I was not.

Comically yours, Art

The New iPad...and a writer's life...

Last Friday, being a dutiful Mac cultist, I drank my iCool aid and headed down to my local Mac store to buy the latest version of the iPad, creatively titled The new iPad. I already owned a first generation iPad (which I blogged about here) and had found it absolutely essential to my life as a writer. I waited for the 3rd generation because I was looking forward to the rumoured retina screen (a fancy way of saying a very high-def screen) and the camera (which was lacking from the 1st generation iPad). I bought the 32GB white wi-fi, because I thought that would be enough storage space for me and I don't need a G4 connection. Wireless is most everywhere (and I do have portable Mifi wireless when needed).

The Screen

Let's start with the screen. It's amazing. There, we're done with the screen. Okay, I'll leave it to others to explain exactly how many pixels it takes to make your eyeballs vibrate with explosive colour. But side by side it's very clear how much more "high def" this screen is. The icons for the apps have no pixelation. Does that make them easier to tap on? Nah, but it somehow makes them see more real. Netflix looks clearer. Movies sparkle. Youtube is ... well, still full of freaky videos. But they're even clearer and grosser now.

Reading Apps:

I'm an ebook-a-holic (along with a paper-book-aholic and an audiobook-a-holic). My apps on my iPad for reading (and buying books) are as follows: Kindle app, Kobo app, iBooks, Nook, Nook for kids, Play Books, Stanza. These apps are pretty simple so I didn't notice a big difference in the speed in which they open. There is a difference in the fonts and how clear they are now to read. And I am especially impressed at how much more colourful the picture books that I have on my iPad look. Nothing replaces a "real" picture book, but the images on the iPad do leap off the page (Especially in Splat the Cat). I do have a few kids books apps that were designed for the iPod and I never noticed a big difference in clarity when they were on my old iPad, but now that I have The new Ipad, the blurred edges of the images becomes very obvious. So reading is even more of a pleasure on The new Ipad as long as what you're reading has been optimized for the iPad (though if I'm reading an ebook I often choose my Kindle because it's smaller and I'm not tempted to zoom around the internet). The new iPad is heavy enough that I usually have to prop it against my legs when I read.

Facetime and Skype

This machine is brilliant for using both these communication programs. The speaker on the back is able to put out more volume than the 1st generation iPad so it's easy to hear whoever you're Facetiming with and the mic seems to pick up fine. One could easily use this to Skype with a classroom just sitting in your reading chair or out in your back yard (assuming there wasn't much background noise). And, last night, my wife's bookclub was discussing Meg Wolitzer's latest novel and she was kind enough to do a Skype visit with the book club. It worked perfectly and in the hour and a half talk it burned 18% of the battery power. I set up a battery-powered speaker so that she could be heard clearly. I was tempted to set her up on a chair and put a coat around her, but decided that would be silly.

Social Networking/Web browsing

There isn't much difference between the iPads. I still use Hootsuite for most of my social "outreach": twitter and Facebook, that is. Things are faster, of course. The biggest difference is that Google+ is more accessible on this machine. Again surfing around the net does appear to be a smoother experience. I don't know if it's the extra speed of the machine or that there are more and more websites optimized for the iPad now.

Keynote

I still use Keynote for my school presentation. This is by far the best aspect of the iPad for me. I can carry all of my presentations with me, and all I need extra is the VGA connector. No power cords, at all.  I connect my iPad to the projector and plug in the sound and the iPad does the rest. I'm very impressed at how it runs everything I can throw at it: book trailers, mp3s, and SFX all embedded in my slides. I use my iPod Touch to run the presentation from the front of the classroom. And I can do a whole day of school visits without having to charge up. I don't miss the days when I had to lug my laptop and my projector and, sometimes, even my screen. There isn't a big change in how Keynote runs on the new iPad. Which is good, because it was running fine before.

Pages

If I'm doing any writing on my iPad (and I do a little, usually with my wireless keyboard) I use Pages (which is my main word processor on my iMac, although I do all my first drafts in Scrivener). It's perfectly functional on the iPad, though obviously the screen is smaller. Apple's iCloud is effective, automatically updating documents between different iPods and iPads, but if I make a change on my computer it doesn't appear on my iPad. I have to upload it to icloud.com (simple drag and drop) and the new file appears on my iPad. I do hope someday there is full synchronization between all mac devices, of course. But this is workable.

PDF's

I teach an online class through the New York Times Knowledge Network. One of the things I was curious about was whether or not I'd be able to mark papers while I was on the road with my iPad. It turns out I can. I download the document, convert it to a PDF using Pages, then use an app called iAnnotate PDF to do all my fancy mark ups. It has  handy highlighting and note-making features. Plus you can circle words in red just using your finger. Such fun! Then I can email it to my student and hope they don't weep when they see all the marks.

So that's my first impressions of The new iPad, so far...

Art

Funny Answers to Odd Authorly Questions II

These are inspired by a few questions I've been asked...actually some of them are real...

Q: I have this great idea. If you write it, I'll split the money with you, 50/50. What do you say? Answer #1: No. Answer #2: No. And don't come to my parties anymore. Answer #3: I'll think about it. What? You're a brain surgeon? Well, is it okay if I perform half a brain surgery on you before we begin? It shouldn't take long.

Q: What's your address? Do you have any children? What are there names? A: You're scaring me. And I think you meant "their names."

Q: Will an agent steal all of my money? A: No. In fact an agent will make you more money. But you have to get the right agent. There's an easy formula for figuring out whether an agent is the right one. E=MC2 x .15% x worldwidesales x your talent quotient / the chance of a Hollywood movie - your personality quotient + your agent's personality quotient x luck. Easy to figure out, eh? Oh, but make sure you don't get the wrong agent. A small percentage of agents will take 15% of your life force and use it to feed their gerbils. Good luck!

Q: How long does it take to write a book? A: 60,000 minutes to start with. That's if you dedicate a minute to each word in the average book. You also have to dedicate a minute to each sentence. That's another 8333.33 minutes. There's another 65,000 minutes for rewriting each word. Add 2500 minutes for computer malfunctions. Then another 4700 minutes for fretting about characters you're going to kill. And 2700 minutes killing them. Only 250 minutes for crying about them, though. I mean, really they were getting on your nerves. Add in the minute that you hover over your email with the MSS attached before you press send. That's 143484.33 minutes. Or about 59.785 work weeks. Maybe add in about 2467 hours of depression if your book is rejected. Then start all over again.

Q: Will I make a million dollars if I publish an ebook by myself? A: Yes. You only have to sell 1 a day for the next 487,804 days. If you sell two a day you'll make the money in half the time.

Art