Skip to content

Posts tagged ‘The Passive Voice’

Mar 5

32 Comments

Choppy waters ahead

I’m going to start out by saying I’m sleep-deprived and cranky (well, crankier than usual) as I sit dow to write this. I’m in the final push to finish everything necessary to get Nocturnal Revelations ready for publication. I’m in the middle of preparing a new entry in the Honor & Duty series. I have a stack of files that is literally a foot tall sitting on my desk for other projects in the pipeline. So I have little patience for some of the crap I’ve been seeing lately on blogs I follow, in social media and in the media in general. Consider this your fair warning. I’m swinging for the fences and getting some stuff off my chest. Read more

Feb 12

36 Comments

Writer Beware

When I began reading Dave’s post yesterday, I smiled and nodded. I’m up to my eyeballs in the final edits for Nocturnal Revelations. My brain is focused on not only the edits but what needs to be done to promote the book between now and release date. So figuring out what to write for MGC is, well, challenging. Because of that, I did what I often do when I’m having a hard time coming up with a topic: I wandered over to The Passive Voice. BTW, if you aren’t following TPV, you should, especially if you are a writer. Anyway. . . . Read more

Dec 11

26 Comments

Reality bites, at least where traditional publishing is concerned

From time to time, I’m asked whether I think a writer should publish their book as an indie or try to go the traditional route. Depending on who it is, I might temper my response a little. By that, I mean I will tell them the decision is theirs to make. Then I ask them why they consider going the traditional route. Almost every time, the answer is the same: they want to get into bookstores. You know me. So you know my follow-up question is to ask them where the closest bookstore is, when the last time was they were in the store and how many books a year do they buy from there. Almost always, you can see the lightbulb go off over their head as they consider the question.  Read more

Aug 3

19 Comments

What we Like vs. What the Literatti Think We Should Like?

If you watch much (or any) PBS programming, you might have noticed a call to vote in The Great American Read poll. Read more

Jul 10

21 Comments

Who — or what — are your characters?

My brain has been on overload the last couple of weeks as I published one book and started on another. Family obligations and scheduling conflicts added to the overload. So the other day I gave up, pulled out my Kindle Oasis and read. Just read. For more than 12 hours, I let my imagination go where several different authors took it. One book was traditionally published and several were indie books. Each had their strong and weak points. Each came to mind when I read a post and the accompanying comments on The Passive Voice yesterday.

PG quoted from a New York Times article telling us we need more diversity in romance novels. Read more

Apr 17

118 Comments

Oh, Diversity

As I sit here, I’ll admit part of me wants to go on a tear about several things currently taking place in and around the con circuit. I’m not going to. Partly because I’m still so angry about one item that I’m not sure I could be anything but profane in my comments. It is also partly because I have neither the time nor the desire to deal with those who would skim until outraged and then pitch fits here or elsewhere. Instead, I’ll deal with another issue that is currently trending when it comes to publishing (and most anything else). Diversity. Read more

Mar 30

39 Comments

5th Friday

Oops. It’s the fifth Friday of the month and that means all the Mad Ones are sleeping in. Well, not all of us since I happen to be up to write this. But it means there’s no regularly scheduled post. What to do? What to do?

Let’s see. There are a couple of stories over at The Passive Voice that caught my eye this morning. The first has to do with Amazon — again. It seems there are reports of Amazon stripping rankings from some “romance” titles. While I haven’t seen much about this, at least not when compared with some of the uproar a few weeks ago over reviews disappearing, there’s enough talk about it to have me suggesting anyone who has published a romance title that might fall into erotica or the “harder” romances check your titles. So far, it appears to be limited in scope but Amazon hasn’t said much, if anything, about it yet and that is always worrisome. Read more

« Older Entries