Lately, I’ve studying how to make better book covers, and every expert out there seems to enjoy starting with the same sentence as in the title: “Readers always judge the book by the cover”.
“Yeah right, I never do that,” was my first reaction.
Uhm, well, then I started to take notice of what I do when I want to find a new book to read…
Needless to say, I got a reality check about just how important it is to choose the right photo and the right font.
And here I thought publishing was easy…lol
So now you know what I will do for the next week or two.
This summer, I spent many hours editing my upcoming title, “Taming the Omega”. And while doing it, I kept listening to the same songs over and over again.
So, when the book was finally complete, it felt natural to list those songs just to thank all those wonderful artists who keep inspiring me.
And thanks to my good friend and fellow author, Hannah Teylen, I collected those songs in a playlist on my YouTube channel. I hope you will enjoy them too.
Sometimes readers ask why I keep posting shorter stories to the Literotica contests. Like, why bother? The short answer is: it’s what I have time for (in between a full-time job, family, house and other obligations.
But the real reason is that I love reading them. No matter how busy I am, I always have time to read a story that my Kindle app estimates would take me half an hour or one hour. Particularly if it’s a new author to me, then I’m very reluctant to spend 8 hours reading their book.
That said, when I first started writing, a short story was a much more difficult task than writing a long one. It probably sounds backwards, but with a long story, you have the chance to flesh out your characters and show why the reader should like that person. While in a short story, every word counts. So because of that, I feel the short story is a much bigger challenge for me personally to write.
Last year, my friend and fellow author, carrteun, organised an author challenge over at Literotica. The topic was to use music as inspiration for a story.
I chose one of my favourite songs and wrote a story called ‘More than words‘ using the title from the song.
Later, I expanded it and published it as ‘Stepbrother‘. Amazingly, this book has become one of my bestselling ebooks.
It’s quite fun to think that all the time I spend enjoying music can actually lead somewhere, lol.
And right now I think I’ve found my perfect inspiration for my Nude Day contest story, thanks to the lovely Eivør and her song ‘Only love’.
When I first started publishing, I never imagined how much time I would have to spend doing other tasks besides the writing. Lol, I guess I have a better idea now. The last few months have been superbusy and I can safely say that I’ve learned a lot about accounting, tax reports and VAT calculation. Still, I wish I could have just spent my time writing, but I doubt the tax collectors would agree.
Anyway, after a stressful time, it would be nice to just take some time off and relax, eh? Instead, everything seems to be happening at once now that our societies have started to reopened. So, the last few weeks have been full of reunions, voluntary work and driving back and forth. I can’t wait to grab a book and sit down in a chair for a few hours. Maybe that’s what we all should do once in a while: to just relax and charge your batteries whenever you find a free moment.
Yeah, I’ll do that. Sit down and watch the weeds grow while I plan my counterattack tomorrow or the day after. Wouldn’t that be something, eh? Maybe you should do the same? And while you do that, enjoy my latest favourite song: Kalandra – The Waiting Game (a definite inspiration for a new story).
I woke up to this message this morning. I’m not a morning person and this didn’t exactly improve the experience.
Anyway, this post is just to alert you why my Wattpad links no longer work. I’m terribly sorry for the inconvenience. I was given no warning or information before this happened. And by doing this, Wattpad effectively prevents all of my readers from finishing the stories I had over there. Not to forget all the comments and messages I had received. All is lost.
I won’t bother rebuilding my Wattpad account. It took an enormous amount of time – time which is better spent writing another book or doing something more fruitful.
I might try Inkitt instead since I’ve heard other authors moving their stuff over there when Wattpad ban them.
If you know of any other sites that I might try, please let me know.
Yay! My brain is working again! And the dizziness has finally vanished too. It’s such a relief to be off that “boatride” (that was what it felt like). It will be a long time before I’m tempted to set my foot on a real boat, lol.
Anyway, the downside is that I’m far behind on everything – including my yearly tax report. Yikes, it’s that time of year again, and (of course) the system is new too – and my numbers have also become more complicated to report. I guess it’s just pure luck that I can actually add two numbers without feeling dizzy, lol.
Still, I can sense that the chocolate box becomes even more appealing these days… Not to forget coffee…
For those of you who have read my latest contribution to the April Fool’s Day contest over at Literotica, this is old news. But I still wanted to add to to my blog to show why I haven’t been as productive as I usually am:
A few words from the author (attached to my April Fool’s Day story on Literotica)
This year, I feared I wouldn’t be able to take part in this contest. My entire family came down with COVID, but the symptoms differed despite having the same illness. For me, it got stuck on my brain. Resulting in something my doctor called mild ‘Alzheimer’s’. I hope I never catch the real thing, to be honest. I’ve struggled to form words and sentences for about a week now. And the short-term memory is terrible. Even writing a simple SMS takes more brain cells than I ever could have imagined.
Anyway, I’m on the mend, but the experience has taught me how much you take for granted until it’s no longer there. And also, I realise how terrible it must be to have Alzheimer’s. My deepest sympathies go to those who have it or know someone who does. I definitely know where my next charity donation will go.
In the meantime, I did manage to piece together a short story for the competition, and I hope you will enjoy it. And as always, votes and comments are highly appreciated.
This blog was never supposed to be full of my political statements but after Russia invaded Ukraine and started killing people, I just can’t look the other way.
But what can you do to prevent power-hungry leaders to steal something that doesn’t belong to them? Why do they believe that starting a war and attacking innocent people is the answer? Why do they have to grab more than their share of the resources available?
The only consolation these days is how countries have united against them. How companies have suddenly developed a sense of social responsibility (about time…), and how we see that financial boycotts are more effective than weapons.
I’m grateful we won’t see the start of the 3. World War and we should probably “thank” Putin for uniting nations more efficiently than we could have done ourselves. But still, war is never to answer. No matter how little you care about other people’s lives.
Still, I think we should remind ourselves that most Russians have never wanted a war against Ukraine. Many children born from Russian immigrants have no responsibility or blame for what Putin and his likes are doing. So, don’t let an 8-year-old child suffer. Let him/her play with your child and don’t blame them for what is not their fault.
And to Coca Cola, now is your chance to show us what you’re made of. If in doubt, take a look at what Apple, Ikea and H&M are doing right now. As for the rest of us, let’s stop filling the pockets of those supporting the war.
I have to say that I’m still a bit shocked by the news that Smashwords will disappear. And there are some real concerns among authors (particularly Erotica authors) that we won’t be able to publish our works anywhere from now on.
I haven’t tried Draft2Digital myself, but I know other authors have shared both positive and negative experiences with them.
But, I’ve a ton of experience with getting my works banned or returned with no particular reason or with reasons that only show they never even bothered to read the story. Then, when I repost the same story, it’s suddenly accepted. It seems that you really have to depend on the person checking your story, and their mood.
Still, back to the merger or acquisition as they call it. There are a lot of benefits too to joining forces against Amazon, and they also have some great ideas when it comes to POD (print on demand), improving their bookstore and making it easier to self-publish.
So, all in all, I’m really excited and looking forward to what’s coming next – as long as they don’t reject all my stories for the erotic content, lol. If that happens, I might have to find another site to publish on.
Ada Stuart 