featuring the Night to Dawn books and Barbara's fiction, and other goodies

Archive for the ‘science fiction / fantasy’ Category

The Making of an EBook

Like many other authors, I am turning to independent publishing, hence my imprint Night to Dawn Magazine & Books. That means hiring artists to do my covers, getting the book edited, shopping ISBN’s, and converting my word file to an eBook. In the case of people whose books I’ve published, it also includes sending out [...]

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A Word with Word, authors, balloons, people, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, vampires, Writing

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Tom Johnson’s Interview with Illustrator Teresa Tunaley

I first became aware of Teresa Tunaley’s illustrations in Barbara Custer’s Night To Dawn magazine a few years back. In fact, I was so taken with Teresa’s art I went to her website and looked at the many pages of fine illustrations she had already done for book covers and magazines. It was no surprise [...]

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Artists, authors, balloons, people, Publishing, romance, science fiction / fantasy, vampires, Writing

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Lulu versus CreateSpace III

After much kvetching and discussion about CreateSpace, I’ve started to publish the NTD paperbacks through them. The latest release, Tales of Masks & Mayhem V4, saw publication through CS. Why? The short answer: money. The Global Distribution package on Lulu costs $75.00 plus whatever you pay for ISBN’s. The Pro plan of CS costs $39.00 [...]

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A Word with Word, Artists, authors, people, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, Uncategorized, vampires, Writing

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When to Hire an Editor

Some time ago I posted the advantages of Autocrit software, and the wisdom found in Writing the Breakout Novel. Autocrit enabled me to catch repetitive words, and I ferreted out problems in my novel when I applied techniques from Writing the Breakout Novel. However, the devil is in the details, and a small press editor [...]

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A Word with Word, authors, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy

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Dark Moon Presents Zombies – Review

Title:  Dark Moon Presents Zombies Edited by: Jason Shayer, Stan Swanson, Jennifer Word, and Frances A. Hogg Available as: eBook ($3.95) and Paperback ($12.95) ISBN-13: 978-0983433538 Where available: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other retailers. Rating: 5 Balloons  A few weeks ago, Julia Jansen offered me the pleasure of reading Dark Moon Presents Zombies. I [...]

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authors, people, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, vampires, Writing

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Autocrit Revisited: When Your Book Needs More…

Some time ago I raved about the merits of Autocrit. I ran Steel Rose and other work through it and became ecstatic when the software ferreted out repetitions, clichés, and problems with sentence structure. I showed up at the PWC with Autocrit-edited work, and learned that Autocrit made a great proofing tool indeed. The extraneous [...]

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A Word with Word, authors, people, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, Writing

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Revisions…and then More Revisions

Over the months, I’ve alluded to a sequel to Dark Side of the Moon: Steel Rose. Steel Rose wound up with its own cast of characters, so I can’t call it a sequel any more. Maybe this is good. At workshops, speakers have advised everyone to put their manuscripts aside for a few weeks, and [...]

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A Word with Word, authors, people, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, Writing

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Editing Software, Anyone?

I’ve read good and bad about writing software over the years, and once considered such gadgets a handy way to flush your money down the sewer pipe. About a year ago writer Gregory Frost talked up Scrivener software, which enables you to edit writing and research at the same time. Scrivener works well, once you [...]

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authors, Healthcare, Publishing, science fiction / fantasy, Writing

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The Call of the Wild

I never thought I would blog about my balloon collection, but as the cliché goes, never say never. Today was an unusual day for grocery trips. I went to a different supermarket, one that didn’t tempt me to buy balloons. More bad weather is coming our way, so I concentrated on buying supplies. I decided [...]

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authors, balloons, people, science fiction / fantasy

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Branding and Facebook

When a workshop leader coaxed everyone to promote their books through branding, I left the workshop confused. To my literal mind, “branding” refers to a cowboy who brands his cattle, marking it as his own, or the trademark a company uses to identify its products.  Then Facebook gave me an appreciation for branding. I’ve enjoyed [...]

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A Word with Word, Artists, authors, balloons, people, science fiction / fantasy, Writing

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