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Self-Publishing Checklist: The Random No One Tells You, Part II

Self-Publishing Checklist: The Random No One Tells You, Part II

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Patty Templeton's Self-publishing Checklist-smallIn Part One of this series, we looked at Firming Out Your Expectations, Picking Your Publisher, and how to do a Reality Check on Your Book Format.

How are we doing so far? Still okay? Good.

So you have a manuscript. You have decided on a publisher. You know weird tips about how your book’s format can affect its price and distribution. Now what?

4. Find or Commission Art

  • What is your vision for your front cover, back cover, and spine?
  • What are examples of books you admire that are in your book’s genre?
  • Do you want to create your own cover, hire someone to do it, or hire your POD publisher to do it?
  • What artists do you admire who fit the tone of your book?

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Where Did the Cat Come From? Or, Who Translated This S&*%?

Where Did the Cat Come From? Or, Who Translated This S&*%?

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Christie 2Talking about subtitles last week got me thinking about book translations. It’s a different beast, of course; for one thing, translating prose isn’t subject to the same time constraints that translating dialogue is. So that should make translations better than subtitles, right?

In general, I think that’s true. However, with one exception, I’m going to focus on occasions when it’s been done badly. After all, when the translation’s done well, no one notices.

We all know examples from our mundane lives of unfortunate, or impossible, translations. I’m sure everyone’s heard the story of Chevrolet having to change the name of their Nova for the South American market. In Spanish, “no va” means “doesn’t go.” Not the best name for a car.

As I’ve mentioned before, I often read in Spanish to keep in practice, and since my preferred reading material is genre (Fantasy, SF and Crime), this has often meant that I’m reading books translated into Spanish.* This can be helpful, since I often own the book in English, and if something gets away from me (miss the meaning of two or three critical words and the whole paragraph can go wonky on you) I can check the original, which is far superior to hauling out the dictionary and trying to sort it out piecemeal. I learned this the hard way.

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Self-Publishing Checklist: The Random No One Tells You

Self-Publishing Checklist: The Random No One Tells You

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there-is-no-lovely-end-switchblade-smallOH MY GAWD! You fancy glitterquill! You wrote a book.

So did I. It took forever. Mostly because I was an undisciplined mess who worked multiple jobs for the majority of the book’s birthing, but HEY! It got done. And… it appears… you’ve done the same. Which is rad. Take a moment to celebrate yourself. I don’t care how you get yer good times (sex, napping, whiskey, dancing, WHATEVER!), but you need to celebrate. For example, I read for a week straight and C.S.E. Cooney got me a sweet potato pie. Which no one else ate. It was ALL MINE. For breakfast. For dinner. There was no guilt ONLY WIN AT LIFE!

But… okay. So you have this thing. It is a manuscript. It is in a Word doc. You want to self-publish it. What the hell happens now? A LOT. Dear GEEZUS, a lot. Are you sure you want to do this? Yes? Okay. Well, here is a list – NOT ALL INCLUSIVE – but a starter guide to the pile of stink you stuck your foot into.

1. Firm Out Your Expectations

  • What do you want from your self-publishing experience?
  • Do you want to be a bestseller? (Um… good luck.)
  • Are you shooting to be a midlist author?
  • Maybe you are a passionate amateur who is publishing for friends and family?

Whatever you are, know it and embrace it. My suggestion… keep your heart and drive high and your expectations low.

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What Did That Say? Or, When is a Subtitle not a Subtitle?

What Did That Say? Or, When is a Subtitle not a Subtitle?

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InigoLately I’ve had some experiences with subtitles that worry me a little. Here’s my problem: just what is it that’s being subtitled, and is there any way for us to know whether we’re missing something?

Usually when I’m watching a movie with subtitles, it’s in a language I have some grip on, like French or Italian. The subtitles are there to help me when the dialogue is too fast, or perhaps too colloquial, for me to follow it directly (though that in itself might be one of the problems, as we’ll see in a minute).  There’s only one thing I watch where I don’t have any real clue on the language, and that’s Japanese anime.

The thing is, I’ve always been a big fan of subtitles over dubbing. I prefer to hear the actors’ own voices – I know how important voice can be, and I figure actors are cast for that as much as for any other quality. Tone is also something it’s virtually impossible to translate. But now, having seen some of the stuff I’ve seen, I’m not so sure I wouldn’t be better off watching a dubbed version.

The only dubbed films or TV shows I regularly watch are dubbed in Spanish, and I do that so my ear doesn’t lose its facility with the language through long periods of disuse. I never use the English subtitles, first, because the whole point is for me to concentrate and follow the Spanish; and second, because, as a reader, my eye is always drawn first to the written word, and I’d be wasting my practice time reading the subtitles instead of listening. Though, I might cheat a bit by watching a movie or an episode first in English, so I can concentrate on the vocabulary rather than on the plot.

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A Phoenix, A Carpet and A Sand Fairy

A Phoenix, A Carpet and A Sand Fairy

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nesbit itLast week I was talking about Lord Dunsany and his role both as an early 20th-century fantasist and the founder/inventor of the club or bar story. Talking about Dunsany reminded me of another early 20th-century fantasist, E. Nesbit. Edith Nesbit’s work actually pre-dates Dunsany’s, but there are a couple of reasons she’s not as well known, or as well respected outside of our field, as he is.

The first one is fairly obvious: female writers don’t get as much recognition and respect as male writers*, but even more obvious is that she’s considered a children’s writer – not YA – and they get even less respect, regardless of gender. About 40 of Nesbit’s approximately 60 novels were written for children.

Not all of these were gems, of course, but there are several which earn Nesbit a place on anyone’s book shelves. The first notable fantasies are her stories of the Bastable children,  The Treasure Seekers (1899), The Wouldbegoods (1901), and The New Treasure Seekers (1904). These were widely (and wildly) popular both at the time they were written and subsequently, but I have to say that even as a child myself, I thought Oswald Bastable needed taking down a peg, and my personal favourites were what’s called the Psammead Series, featuring the siblings Robert, Anthea, Jane, and Cyril, along with their baby brother known as the Lamb.

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25 Ways to Support (Indie) Authors

25 Ways to Support (Indie) Authors

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Has this thought ever walked across your brain: My friend wrote a book. What now? It ain’t selling and I want to help.

Well, bless your soul, dear heart. You are a darn good friend. Here are a few suggestions on how to bump up your friend’s confidence and sales.

1. Give the author your money. Buy the book.

Patty cat's paw

2. Give them more money. Buy the book as a gift, too.

Give them money

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Lou Anders: Why I Write What I Write How I Write it

Lou Anders: Why I Write What I Write How I Write it

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Frostborn with BlurbIf you haven’t heard yet, award-winning editor and art director Lou Anders’s new book has hit the shelves, and it’s causing quite a stir. It’s already chalked up a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly and critical acclimation from a whole host of additional outlets. I thought it high time to sit down with Lou so he could tell Black Gate readers what his book was all about! Take it away, Lou.

I’ve always loved fantasy stories. As a child, I read The Hobbit over and over. One of my most prized possessions is a large, coffee table edition of Tolkien’s original version, featuring concept art and production stills from the 1977 Rankin/Bass animated musical television special. It was given to me by my uncle’s family, and I still have it today, dust jacket and everything! I studied the lavish illustrations for hours on end and taught myself to draw the Goblin King. It was the first in a large collection of Middle Earth-related volumes.

When I wasn’t reading, I painted miniature figures. I had a huge, faux-grass covered table in my bedroom where I’d assembled an entire army of Riders of Rohan versus orcs and half orcs. My friends and I played Dungeons & Dragons on weekends (guess who was the game master?) and my best friend and I watched Star Wars over a hundred times easy. I read everything I could get my hands on by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Michael Moorcock, Robert E. Howard, and Fritz Leiber. I even built a round wooden shield out of a barrel top (it was heavy!) and used a staple gun to attach strips of thin metal to craft an outfit out of canvas.

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Writer’s Workshops: Under the Black Flag

Writer’s Workshops: Under the Black Flag

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Clarion 85 shirtI actually once said to a fellow writer, “The best thing you could do for art is cut off your hands and bury your typewriter.”

Beyond the words themselves, it’s hard to know what’s worse about this: that I said it to someone I’m sure I liked or that I can’t remember to whom I said it.

I know it was at the Clarion Writer’s Workshop in the summer of 1985, then held at Michigan State University in East Lansing. I knew it was someone I liked, because I liked every one of my fellow workshoppers. As I got to know the 16 other participants, I felt these are my people!

The context for the remark was a workshop session. For those unfamiliar with the format, everyone in the workshop delivers an oral critique of a manuscript handed out — and one hopes, read — in advance, then the author responds. Clarion workshops are machines for producing pithy one-liners — often put downs — the best (worst?) of which are memorialized on tee-shirts printed in the last week or two of the workshop.

So how was my comment received? With laughter, unbelievably. It was even graphically depicted in our year’s tee-shirt. (Image courtesy of Bill Shunn.)

I should say that my class was, according to our instructors, famously cohesive and collegial. Either they lied to make us feel good or other Clarion classes went at each other with lawn darts.

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Lord Dunsany and the Billiards Club

Lord Dunsany and the Billiards Club

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Jorkins1I’ve always thought that “Lord Dunsany” has to be one of the more perfect names for a fantasy author. You might argue that this isn’t his name, merely his title, and that Edward Plunkett might not sound quite so perfect, fantasy-wise. But on the other hand, it’s really Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, and growing up I always believed that the “Drax” must somehow derive from “draco.” While I’ve never been able to confirm that, I still feel that it should be so, and that in a perfect world, someone in his lordship’s family was named for a dragon – which really would make it the perfect name for a fantasy author.

All of which would work out quite well, not just for his lordship, but for us, since Dunsany is one of the leading figures in 20th-century fantasy, whose work predates that of Lewis and Tolkien. The quality that I’ve always associated with Dunsany’s writing is an air of sublimity. There’s always the feeling in his work of great immensity, of something just outside of our reach, that we’re only being shown a part of a much greater whole. A couple of posts ago, I was talking about types of magic, and in those terms, Dunsany’s falls into the category of the mysterious, rather than the quantifiable.

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