Why am I still a Cowboys Fan?

I've followed the Dallas Cowboys since forever. Don Meredith was QB, All American from UNM Don Perkins was RB. Suffered BS (Before Stauback) when Tom Landry would alternate QB's with each possession between Stauback and Morton. Hoping beyond hope that Danny White would somehow figure a way to win the conference championship game and make it to the Super Bowl, only to be crushed time and again. The agony has always been worse than the ecstasy.
Wife and I timed her contractions when she went into labor with our daughter while watching the Pokes lose a game the last year Landry was coach.
 Ah the glory days of Super Bowl victories, the despair of Super Bowl losses, but at least they went to the playoffs, won more than they lost and if they had a bad year there was always the Denver Broncos to fall back on especially with Elway.
Since Aikman and company, what a great team they had for a few years, there's been nothing worth rooting for, but still every game the adrenaline ramps up, I hold my breath on important plays and hope with futile hope that Romo will not get intercepted in the last minutes of a game or the center won't hike the ball over his head, or a wide open receiver drops the ball in the end zone or when they do catch the game winning touchdown at the last second a ref drops a yellow flag.
I'm sure everyone who has spent 50 or more years following a beloved team has similar feelings because all teams have their good years and bad years.
I really wonder about Detroit fans when their team has never been to the Super Bowl. Come to think of it, have the Jags and Panthers ever gone to the big game? It must gall Cleveland fans that the team they rooted for that never made it to the Super Bowl moves to Baltimore and has won two.
As I said I follow the Broncos, yell and scream when they score or get intercepted, but I don't get the adrenaline rush in their games like I do with the Cowboys it's just not the same.

Maximum Frustration

I sent the manuscript and cover to Lithexcel on Tuesday expecting to have ten books in hand by now. They haven't even given me a quote yet and aren't returning my calls. Guess I'll need to find another printer.
Smashwords has accepted the manuscript, but not the cover. This means the book will be on their site, but won't go out on their list to other companies like I-books or Nook. They want the picture to be 1400 pixels in width and 1700 pixels in height. Using Publisher I can get my front cover to 1000 pixels in width and 1350 in height. That's 24" in height and 17" in width, what the fuck to they want a wall size painting?
They recommended using a free picture program named Gimp. I downloaded it. Actually got the dimensions they want, but can't size the picture to the frame. Oh the program is free, but if you want to figure it out Amazon sells about five books starting at 25 bucks to 30 bucks.
I've removed the book from SW.
Speaking of Amazon, they at least have a cover maker program, but you use it while publishing and you can't save the picture or download the program. Amazon has the KDP select where their members on Prime can borrow a book for free every month. If you put your book up for this you can't be e-published anywhere else, for three months.

Lithexcel finally got back to me and I'll have the first ten books Tuesday.

Fan Plan Meteor Strike Published

 Today I sent Fan Plan Meteor Strike to the printer and I should have the hard copy in hand by the end of the week. I've e-published it on Smashwords and it is available now for a mere ninety-nine cents until Monday October 21 when I will raise the price of the e-book to $1.99 and e-publish on Amazon at the same price, but it will be available on Kindle Direct Publishing so those who are members of Amazon Prime can borrow the book for free.The paper and ink book will sell for $10.00 each. The beauty of doing my own publishing is that I can retail the books for what would be my cost through Create Space and other print-on-demand companies. Those companies also insist that e-books sell at paper and ink book prices.

I need to write the second book in the trilogy Fan Plan Next Generation, edit Human Sacrifices and Vander's Magic Carpet to publish them in paper and ink before finishing the trilogy with Fan Plan The Count Down. Methinks there is much work to be done.

Zebra Balloon

It's that time of year again in Albuquerque. Our international balloon fiesta. We stopped braving the crowds after our kids became adults and leave it to them to take the grandkids. Where I work is very close to the park and it's easier to watch from there. Here's a video of a zebra balloon that flew overheard Saturday.

My obligatory Breaking Bad post

Today in the NY Times there's an obituary of the show. It finished with these words:

But the show never fully spelled out why Walt broke away from Gretchen and Elliott in the first place.

There were hints throughout the series. On several occasions, Walt accused them of cheating him out of his share; that bitterness seemingly helped steer him into his life of crime. But it wasn’t clear that his version was correct — in an episode where they confront each other at a restaurant, Gretchen said that Walt left her without any explanation. And the true story never came out.

“Breaking Bad” brilliantly tracked Walt’s transformation from teacher to criminal mastermind. But it’s still a mystery why that talented chemist turned his back on fame and fortune and became a humble high school chemistry teacher.

That is one secret Walter White took to the grave.

 

Here's my two cents worth on the descent of Walter White brilliant scientist to zombie science teacher. To a certain degree the first year of the show is the anti-Mr. Holland's Opus. There's more to being a teacher than getting a paycheck, Walt never understood that.

1. Jessie tries to talk Walt into quitting reminding him that in the beginning all he wanted to make was 270k to see is family comfortable after he's gone. They now have millions so why keep going. Walt tells him that he sold his shares in Gray Matter for a couple of months rent before it got big and that GM is now worth 27.5 Billion dollars, he checks on it. Knowing what he could have had and threw it away has eaten at his soul all his life from that time on.
2. When Walt meets with Gretchen and tries to get her to say they are paying for his treatment without explanation, this is where she says he left without explanation. Here it takes a little reading between the lines. Walt is verbally abusive to her. There was a reason he left and sold out. My reading is he suspected her of having an affair with Elliot, but wouldn't accuse her of it directly. The fact that Gretchen and Elliot then get married and go on to live on Mount Olympus reinforces his suspicion and animosity. It explains also why he won't take their guilt money or sympathy. Pride goeth before a fall, and it certainly applies with Walt in the first season.
3. A quick scene where Walt and Skyler are looking at buying the house. She's pregnant with Walt Jr., he's working at Sandia Labs, which is much better pay than teaching. He wants a bigger house, she's conservative and wants to go small and get a bigger house later.
4. The explanation for his lung cancer is that it came from his work at a lab, I think they said Los Alamos, but the other scene it was Sandia Labs. Could have been both or they forgot to have a continuity check between episodes. Reading into this, Skyler may have nagged Walter into leaving the labs due to the radiation he was working with, though it was too late. Skyler took a man capable of being a master of the universe and turned him into Harvey Milktoast. Walt was a brilliant mind forced to wander in the wilderness of mediocrity for most of his life. 
5. Face it Walter is whipped the whole series, nothing says this louder than after Jessie pours gasoline on their carpet and he's frantic to have it cleaned up before she gets home when they have a storage shed with over 80 millions dollars. Now that is one whipped man!
6. I'm not dissing Skyler, she's right. All that money made them live in fear, it gets Hank killed, she's terrorized by masked men, they become destitute and Walt is on the run finally dying in a shoot out.
7. Skyler loved Hank the school teacher and fights his every attempt to break out of the mold she forced him into. Hank hated his life and when he knew his days were numbered he equated love with money only his pride wouldn't let  him accept Elliot and Gretchen's offer, and chose to make it outside the law. The tragedy of living outside the law is you lose the protection of the law.
8. The ascent of Walter White from zombie science teacher to super meth cook was his death sentence. He finally admits it in the last episode that he did all of it for selfish reasons. Breaking the law and living in fear made him feel alive. Maybe taking a ride on a bull named Fu Mancu would have been better.

Bummed on Sleepy Hollow

I tried to watch Sleepy Hollow. It started out okay for network TV series which has a censorship handicap over cable and premium channels. Then they got into the 4 horsemen of the Apocalypse crap. To set the record straight: Death rides a pale horse, the color of ashes. Not white like in the show.

Revelation 6  (Greatly redacted)

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

The First Seal—Rider on White Horse

 I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer.

The Second Seal—War

 ⁴ And another, a red horse, went out; and to him who sat on it, it was granted to take peace from the earth, and that men would slay one another; and a great sword was given to him.

The Third Seal—Famine

⁵ I looked, and behold, a black horse; and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand.

The Fourth Seal—Death

 I looked, and behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him.

The Fifth Seal—Martyrs

The Sixth Seal—Terror

Okay, if you have ever seen any of the old sand and sandals movies about ancient Rome, they used to have something called a triumph, modern day parades descend from them. Envision these seven seals as a military triumph.
The conquering general would led the triumph riding a white horse and the defeated Kings or generals would follow behind him as captives. Jesus is riding the white horse, War, Famine and Death are defeated and follow him as captives. After the captives would come the victorious army, which would be the martyrs. The sixth seal or all the natural calamities like earthquakes, volcanos, floods, etc are also shown as under the control of Jesus.

Now can you see why I can't stomach Hollywood bastardizing the Bible.

Golf Course Balloons

Went to the local golf course. Haven't been there since May when it was awful. Winter kill left nothing but dirt. They've closed off the front 9 and reseeded and it won't be open till Spring when they close off the back nine and do the same. Today the executive 9 was in the best shape since I started playing there in 2000. And Rainbow Riders landed. They love flying over my house about once or twice a month, but today they only made it as far as the golf course about three miles north.

Found a Printer

I put out a post on my Writers 2 Writers fb page for a local printer that could do what Lightning Source is doing. Gerdean O'Dell and Jill Lane recommended Print Express and LithExcel and I appreciate their recommendations. I can now print my books at 50.00 for an ISBN and a 6X9 book of 200 pages will run $4.00 per book. I can pick them up so there's no shipping. If I buy ten books it comes to less than a hundred dollars. I sell the ten books at ten bucks each which breaks me even, but I can buy more and I'll be making 60% profit from that point on.. I'm not looking to make a killing off printed books, just want to have some and go back to doing book signings. I can still price the e-books at .99 or up to 2.99. This way if those at a book signing don't have the money they can always buy them at home.
At this price over time I can re-print Optimus: Praetorian Guard, print Human Sacrifices and Vander's Magic Carpet.
Not sure about the children's book Friends Forever I publish for Anne Littlewolf, but we're working on some senior picture books that this should work for.
A whole new world jut opened up for me, ain't it great?

A touchy issue: same sex marriage

This video was shown at my church this past Sunday. I agree with most of it. I was forced to define my position on same sex marriage. This is what I've concluded.

I am a licensed Southern Baptist Minister. I am also a citizen of the United States and understand the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It is possible to hold certain religious beliefs without making them the law of the land. There is no cognitive dissonance here. Jesus said it best: "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and unto God what is God's."
I feel it is time to voice my opinion on the issue of same sex marriage.

• Is homosexuality a sin? From my interpretation of the Bible as a Baptist it is, but so is the fact I'm divorce and remarried, so is lust, greed, envy, gluttony, pride etc. No sin is greater or lesser and as Romans 3:23 states: For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
• Can a person or couple living in this lifestyle be saved? All sinners can be saved even if they continue to commit the sin. If God withdrew his salvation because of continual sin, then those who smoke and can't quit are lost (ruining God's temple), I would be lost for the thirty-five years I've been remarried while my ex-wife still lives (committing adultery). Those who get angry and commit murder in their heart would be lost. The point Jesus made in his Sermon on the Mount was about the impossibility of salvation through the law and the importance of forgiveness for God's forgiveness is absolute over all sins.
• Should the Church allow same sex couples membership? By all means yes. If churches started refusing sinners from joining, the pews would be empty and the pulpit vacant. I have a feeling that many Christians will be shocked entering the pearly gates to find this kind of sinner also present.

I have lived next door to, worked under and with, as well as taught students who live this life style. They are human beings and deserve all rights guaranteed under the constitution. As a Christian I am to treat them as any other of God's children and as an American respect their rights as they respect mine.

Two big issued on this have come up in New Mexico the last couple of weeks. The state constitution does not specify gender concerning marriage. Gary King the attorney general for the state was asked to render a decision on the matter, and he punted saying it should be left to the legislature. He is going to run for Governor next year. A county clerk in Los Cruces decided to start issuing same sex marriage licenses. Surprisingly the Tea Party Governor did not call an emergency session on the issue and punted as well. She is up for re-election.
A number of couples sued to get a court order issued forcing their county clerks to issue same sex licenses. As of yesterday eight counties are now issuing them. Those against this are crying foul, because they are suing only in the counties where the county clerk is in favor and does not argue against them at the hearing, so only one side is represented. In an adversarial legal system this is a valid point.
The argument for allowing same sex marriage is that since the constitution doesn't specify or prohibit these marriages they should be allowed. All laws by their nature forbid and what is not forbidden is permitted.
The argument against has two points. 1. When the state constitution was written in 1912, it wasn't an issue that needed to be addressed. The state had sodomy laws making homosexuality illegal. These laws were repealed in the 1960's. Therefore the "spirit" of the law should be observed not the "letter" of the law. (A little irony here, those against are the "strict constructionists" on Roe V Wade, but flip flop when their ox is gored). 2. Precedent: A few years ago a county clerk issued same sex marriage licenses and the state Supreme Court ordered her to stop. This decision should be upheld until such time as the state Supreme Court reviews and overturns its previous ruling. Gary King as AG has ordered that the marriage licenses from this time are valid and to be honored. A previous AG said they weren't.
The Sticky Wicket
The state Supreme Court did issue a ruling recently angering many against same sex marriages. A couple approached a photographer about taking pictures at their wedding. The professional photographer refused citing his religious beliefs on the issue. The couple found another photographer who was cheaper. You'd think that would be the end of it, but they sued the first photographer for discrimination. The state Supreme Court ruled against the photographer and he was forced to pay damages. This could be construed as the state Supreme Court tacitly approving the licenses.
Those who have been oppressing same sex couples can now claim victimhood. This poor picked on religious fanatic has been harmed. Pardon my sarcasm, but if the guy didn't want to do the job he could have said no and left it at that, he didn't have to give a reason or a sermon. Ever since the sit in at a Woolworth's lunch counter public businesses have been required to serve all customers. There are consequences of discrimination under Civil Rights law. Sorry Mr. Photographer you should have kept your mouth shut or done what you are in business to do, take pictures at weddings. A photography studio is not a church.
Should a pastor who is opposed to same sex marriages be compelled to officiate one? No. The pastor and Church is covered by the first amendment. Public businesses are not.
In Conclusion:
What is happening right now in New Mexico is known as a fait acompli. By the time the legislature meets nothing they do will change what's happened. Its a done deal. Like the fight over legalized abortion that doesn't mean it will go away. The rabid fundamentalists will have another dead horse to beat, but what else is new? They fired all missionaries that were divorced and remarried when they took over the SBC in the 1980's for the sin of living in adultery, and I have been treated as a second class Christian due to their misinterpretation of God's mercy and grace. That doesn't mean all Christians are that deluded or insensitive to other's spiritual needs.
I  have no problem with same sex marriage. Religiously its an issue of all God's children being sinners and to love them as He loves me. Politically it's an issue of equal human rights. I, or any other Baptist, do not have the right to legislate the morality of another person based on the what the Bible says. The first amendment protects me from other religions forcing me to believe their way and protects others from me forcing them to believe my way. That's freedom of religion and the free exercise of it.

Fan Plan: Meteor Strike

Finally getting a handle on the pricing of books I've reached a conclusion. Keeping the cost of the book at retail to $10.00 I've edited out thirty thousand words and reduced the font to 9 and 10. Not satisfactory.
The book has to be readable and font that size is just too small. Cutting so much back story and other places made the story a little too Spartan.
So I'm turning the story into three books.
Book one I've named Fan Plan: Meteor Strike bringing back the Drake and Eastman family history. The story starts with the meteor strike in 1965 and the formulation of the Fan Plan then back tracks to the 1920's with the creation of Trans Global Oil and Fort Worth Steel. It will end in 1969 as Patrick Eastman and his O'Neal half-brothers go through Faith Boot camp.
Book 2 will cover the 1970's through 2000 as the third generation of Eastman's and O'Neal's head off to college, get married and start working for the company and foundation.
Book three will end in 2012 adding the fourth generation of children.
By breaking up the story I'm able to devote more time to fully explore the wide variety of characters in the family and all the measures they take to prepare for a world wide disaster.

Comparing Create Space with Lightning Source.

Fellow Wayland Alum and chess master, Terry Austin, sent me what it would take to publish on Lightning Source. Thought I'd do a comparison.

Lightning Source (Underlining mine)

Professional Cover Design - $150-175

ISBN - $25 if you buy 10 at a time or I think $100 if you want just one.

             Not a bad price if you're publishing ten books. Initial out of pocket would be $250.00.

Print Set up - $37.50 for cover and $37.50 for interior

Printed Proof (if you want to see one) - $30.00

The cost of each book is calculated according to size:

·        $0.15 per page

·        $0.90 for cover

A 200 page book will cost you $3.90 plus good discounts if you buy quantities.

 

Lightning Source lists the book on Amazon and other sellers and take care of all order fulfillment for them. They send you a check every few months for those sales.

 

Create Space:

Professional cover design starts at $250

ISBN - three choices:

• free, but Amazon has publisher rights and marketing rights
• $10.00, author has publishing rights, Amazon has marketing rights
• $99 author has all rights.

 Print Set up: Free for cover and interior

Printed proof, I've now purchased two at $3.00 + $3.59 S&H = $6.59 each.

Cost of Fan Plan: 180 pages minimum purchase price is $5.03 so I set the selling price at $5.99.

 

Lightning Source                                                           Create Space

$25.00 ISBN                                                                  Better choice for ISBN

$70.00 print set up.                                                        Print set up free

$30.00 for printed proof                                                 $6.00+ per book

 

Initial set up $125.00                                                      Initial set up price of printed proof

 

Long term $4.00/book beats $6.00/book. It would take purchasing 60 books to recover the initial set up costs of Lightning Source. I'm not sure I'll buy that many books. I'm thinking of around 20 or 30 to have an inventory for book sales. There's less temptation to give the books away if inventory is low.

 

Lightning Source does have wider marketing with more outlets than just Amazon, and Kindle. The $99.000 ISBN lets you expand marketing. Amazon does offer wider marketing, but at additional cost.

 

The real decider is shipping and handling costs. If Lighting Source has a better purchase discount for authors and equal or lesser S&H then it might be the better choice. Right now Create Space looks like the better choice.

Here's a reply from my friend:

Pat,

 

I saw your blog post last night and had a couple of thoughts if you are going to compare Lightning Source and Create Space. Since you currently design your own covers, you will not have the $150-175 cost of cover design. Lightning Source does not design anything, that is simply what I pay for a professional designer. If you are simply interested in selling enough books to get your money back, here is the scenario with Lightning Source.

 

·        Pay approx. $100 for setup ($37.50 for cover, $37.50 for interior, $12 for catalog listing)

·        Purchase an ISBN $55.00 (Bowker has a plan for independent publishers)

·        Pay $4 per book (you really don’t want to use a font smaller than 11 pt if you want people to read the book).

·        Set the retail price at $15 (or $14.99 if you wish) so you will make at least $10 per book sold.

·        You have approx. $150 invested

·        Sell 15 books and you have your money back.

 

It’s a pretty scaled down model but it does allow you to get your money back quickly. Also, there is nothing to keep you from selling more books. Unlike Publish America or Create Space, you own the book totally, Lightning Source is simply a printer, you have complete control.

 

Thanks Terry for sharing.

What intrigues me now is that using LS over CS I'm free to e-publish at any price I want. With CS I can put it on KDP which goes out for free to those on Amazon Prime, but it can't be published anywhere else. The e-book and paper book have to be priced the same, I do get a bigger royalty off the e-book. But why pay the same for an e-book? Most of the cost in a paper book is in the materials. E-books are electrons.

Conclusion: I'm already committed to CS for Fan Plan. I like the ISBN options better here. I may revise Human Sacrifices and Vander's Magic Carpet and have LS print them. Something to think about anyway.

Proof book

 
 
 
 
 
Book cover submitted, final edit submitted, Create Space offered a free pdf for proofing or I could buy a printed copy for a little over two bucks, but with their shipping it came to a little over six. Here's a picture of me holding it. When I checked the picture I used for the cover it was copyrighted. So I came up with a new cover from pictures I've taken myself.
First thing I noticed was the print was way too small. I normally use 1.0 reading glasses and I had to use my 2.75 reserved for reading pill bottles. It was rather easy to proof on the hard copy and then make corrections for resubmittal, which I did today. Create Space will get back to me most likely tomorrow and I hit the final submission buttons for it to become a living breathing novel in both hard copy and e-book. I upped the font from 9 to 10 adding 40 pages and upping the price from 4.99 to 5.99. I really wanted to keep it at five bucks, but the print was just too small. It doesn't matter with e-books because the readers let you change the size of the print. I don't expect to sell a lot of hard copy's, but this book is special and I wanted a hard copy of it along with the ones of Optimus.
I'm thinking about turning Human Sacrifices and Vander's Magic Carpet into hard copy too now I've figured out how to get published this way.

A Tale of Two Publishings part three

I started writing The Fan Plan in 2011. The story just took off in my mind and I had fifty thousand words in a matter of weeks. I knew that this was a story that deserved to be in hard cover. I thought about using PA again, but didn't want to be nickeled and dimed like last time. I looked into Create Space when I first started e-publishing, but decided against hard copy for Vander's and HS. There is also the problem of the same price being set for hard copy and e-book. This never made sense to me. I mean there's a printing cost and material cost for a 6X9 paper book. Why charge the same price for something delivered by and read by electrons? The advantage of e-readers is that you don't have to pay 3 to 5 bucks in shipping costs.
I asked around to the other writers at Southwest Writer's Workshop and Writer's 2 writers concerning other POD companies. Many seemed to be better than PA because they will release the book on e-format with the publishing, but again e-book and paper are same price.
I then thought about simply going to a local printer and paying them print the book acting as my own publisher, but they all need a volume of from a hundred to a thousand copies which is way beyond my budget up front.
So wanting this novel to be in paper I started the process with Create Space. It is much more complicated than PA.
I set up an account and started doing their steps. I submitted the manuscript for their review which says takes 2-3 days before they get back to you, but is usually ready in a day. They came back with format problems. I had to download their template and copy and paste from the Smashword's template onto theirs. It makes sense because you're downsizing from letter to a 6X9 page where the left page has narrower margins than the right page. If threw o
ff all the indentations and other formats. At this time the story was 120 thousand words. Going through the story to re-indent and paragraph led me to do a little trimming to move it out of the R rated category to a PG.
They also had me download instructions on making the books cover. Their instructions were for Adobe IP. I downloaded and could use this program for 30 days. It costs $400. I really do hate instructions that say if click on this then this screen should pop up then click on this link, because guess what, when you click on the this the screen they say should pop up doesn't and you can't go on! I did through trial, error and multiple temper tantrums turning my poor German Shepherd into a quivering mass of jelly came up with a book cover complete with spine and back page. All to be told when submitted that the pictures didn't have enough pixels. I've made three other covers using different pictures in HD 1141X1000, it still says not enough pixels. I give up and am using the last cover. My thirty day trial was over by the third try but I've had Microsoft Publisher since it was free for taking an Intel Teach to the Future class ten years ago. I worked with it and came up with the latest cover. When I looked at their pdf of the cover it looked fine to me. The pictures were clear, not blurred as they said it would be.
Cover entered, reworked story entered I submitted them and got to the part about pricing. It calculated the printing of the book at $4.77/copy and I could price it at anything above that. $4.99 makes sense, but that only gives me 23 cents per paper book and a buck thirty seven per e-book. I downloaded a pdf proof copy, but instead did another edit trimming it down a hundred pages to 98,000 words. This cut out a lot of back story, but after a good run through makes the plot quicker. I'm still setting the price at 4.99, but the publishing cost is down to 4.37.
Everything is now re-submitted. I have a pdf proof copy and purchased a hard copy today. The proof copy was 2.62 +3.59 shipping and I will have it in a week. I'll wait to do the proof on the hard copy then transfer them to the pdf for resubmittal. I'll also be able to judge the cover to see if it looks good enough.
All in all I'm happier with Create Space than with PA. They offer professional editors and cover artists, but at way too big a price for a retired educator. I can see how other authors getting tired of paying agents and being pushed around by traditional publishers would go this way. It gives more control over the integrity of your story and affordable pricing.

A Tale of Two Publishings part two

Before I get to Create Space a few words about e-publishing. When I published Optimus it was by far the best way to get published. The traditional way of publishing was to find an agent (not very easy), who would send it to an editor who would then send the manuscript back for revisions taking your hard work and squeeze all the life out of it to satisfy the cookie cutter marketing dept's demands. If they accepted it there might be a three to five year delay before it reached print and bookstores. They wouldn't accept a work that didn't merit 50,000 copies. It was that or self-publish with a 2 or 3 thousand dollar up front cost and then buy your books from them. Then came Print On Demand, like Publish America and many others. No up front costs, no large print runs. The bea
uty of this is they can print one or a thousand in next to no time. a revolution in publishing. In 2006 after two years of beating my head against the traditional wall this was a godsend. But as explained in the last post their grip on the price of the book and shipping costs kept me from being able to market it successfully.
Then I discovered e-publishing. Wow what a liberation. I wrote my first novel in 1991 for Ted Turner's Tomorrow Awards. It was gathering dust. While writing Optimus I wrote a short story with a female protagonist as an exercise in strengthening my female characters. For years I would in the evenings find a picture and describe everything about it in detail, this quickly turned into weaving the details into one to three page stories, what later I found are called "flash stories."
E-publishing let's the author set the price from free on up. Anything under 2 dollars gets a 35% royalty over 2 bucks is 70 to 75%. I sold a few stories, but at the same time I started downloading and reading other e-books. I quickly realized that free stories had lots of downloads and anything over a buck was bypassed. I am just as guilty at going for the cheap. I mean I can download on my kindle eight really good novels for a buck, why pay more?
The three anthologies I priced for free. The two novels I priced at .99. Amazon makes you price at least .99, but if you publish KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) those who are members of Kindle Prime borrow the stories for free and you get a percentage of the set amount per year they put into the kitty for every time your book is borrowed. The catch your story has to be exclusive. Smashwords sends your story to Nook, Pubit, I-books, Sony, Diesel, and through them on eight different formats. In the two and a half years since I started e-publishing I've been getting bi-yearly royalties from both publishers. I make about three times as much from Amazon, but I still submit to both. The good thing is that I have my stories being purchased in the UK, Canada, Denmark, France, and Germany. In those two years only one month was nothing sold. Usually I have three to five sales per month and around the holidays I usually have over ten. January seems to be a good month as everyone with a new e-reader starts buying.
I started taking a number of my flash stories and turning them into short stories, then publishing them. My anthologies are: Flash Stories Married Love, Erotic Flash Stories, More Erotic Flash Stories.
Short Stories are: Wife Quest, Woman on the Beach, Car Hop, Super Erotic Bowl, (Sapphire, Misty and Velda), Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair, Convert or Corrupt, Companion, Happy Triple, First Friday: Aug-Oct, Brenda's Story, Companion: Sasha's Story, Esmerelda, and Shari Sadeyes.
Amazon for some reason lowered the price on Convert or Corrupt to free and in three months I had over two thousand downloads. I didn't mind as it got my name in reader's minds.
I republished the anthologies and short stories under the pen name of Javan Tenebrae. With my novels having religious themes it was better to separate the titles. Not that these stories are all that erotic, I'd rate the stories at PG-13 or R, but because it is adult themed I felt it best to label them as erotic. Most erotic stories on amazon and smashwords are pornographic and I hate having mine in that category. The one review I received on amazon for Convert and Corrupt complained that it wasn't erotic enough.
In 2012 I republished Optiumus as an e-book. Of the approx. 140 books I bought in five years I sold maybe sixty. So far in a year and a half I've sold fifty copies in e-book. At only .35/download compared to two or three dollars per book sold, maybe not that much money, but I don't have to keep an inventory that's given away, no book signings taking up my time. Yes at this rate I'll never recover the $70 paid to PA to convert it to e-book and the $200 spent getting my rights back, but I have around ten readers in Europe that I'd never be able to reach otherwise.
The beauty of e-publishing is you can revise and resubmit the stories as you grow as a writer. The more stories or novels you put out there the more your name gets known building a fan base and royalties start adding up.
It's easier to market. Every time I meet someone socially I can give them my card and tell them go to my website (Yahoo website lets you forward to another link which is my Smashword's dashboard, so going to my website of pmprescottenterprises.com and there's my novels.) I can also tell them to look up my name on Amazon to find my books there for kindle. Not always, but after I've given my card to someone I'll get an e-mail telling me someone bought one of my novels.

A Tale of Two Publishings part one

 Optimus: Praetorian Guard was published in Nov. of 2006. I contacted Publish America in August of that year, submitted my manuscript and gave suggestions for the cover, a picture of the author, bio and description in September. In October they sent a pdf galley to proof and got my approval for the cover, which was exactly as I described it. I found a number of changes which I documented and they corrected. It was published in November and I had the first two books in hand to be submitted to the Copyright office with a check for $35. I received a congratulatory letter with a dollar bill on it.
They set the price at $21.95 per book. In five years I bought 126 books from them costing me around $12 per book. I paid $70 to have them convert it to e-book on Amazon, Google Books and their site. They upped the price of the book to $27.95 even for the e-book. I bought 6 copies in hard back at $32.00 each which they priced at $35. This was for vanity to actually sell.
 Most of the books I sold were to my mother. She either gave them to friends or sold them to members of her Sunday school class, pastors and anyone she could brag to for having a son who's an author.
I donated two books to the West Mesa High School library getting my picture in the school newspaper. A few of my teaching friends bought books, even the principle. I gave a lot of them as gifts for birthdays and Christmas. For everyone I sold, most at $15 since no one would buy them for over 20 I gave away at least three. I did a number of book signings at Hastings, Bibles Plus, B Dalton in Cottonwood while it was there. I seemed to sell four books in four hours each time.
The summer of 2007 I spent in Canton Tx helping Mom with Dad while in hospice. I set up book signings before the diagnoses giving him six to eight weeks to live. Mom paid for my flights back to Albuquerque to keep those book signings. While back home I did have a few family things to take care of and get my classroom ready for the coming year. For a book that sold for twenty dollars my cut after the book store's take was three dollars. Let's see $12/4=$3 per hour. They would order ten books and I purchased at retail the remaining so they didn't get sent back. Those book signings proved very expensive.
Fred Aiken teaches a class through Southwest Writers on the business side of writing and he walks his students through how to claim expenses on your income tax. That year I had lots of deductions.
I continued to do book signings whenever a good friend like Dave Corwell invited me join him at a flea market in Tijeras Canyon or Tesuque Pueblo, even did eight hours at the State Fair. Sold books everywhere, but the fair. That's when I gave up on book signings. I started checking Amazon.com for used copies of my book and started rebuying them for around eight dollars including 3.99 shipping and handling, cheaper than getting them from PA.
All told there is about 140 copies out there. Total spent at PA was over $1300. Add the ones purchased from Bible's Plus, three different Hastings, B Dalton's and the used ones from Amazon it's still under the three thousand up front cost to self publish from a college friend who quoted me this price a little over a year ago.
Back to PA. I paid 70 dollars to get the book converted to e-book, but six months later it still wasn't converted. There was no one to contact to complain. I submitted Human Sacrifices and when the editor e-mailed me back concerning it I sent word to her that I wouldn't publish until they did what I already paid for. It was promptly converted and available at Amazon, Google books didn't get it for a year. I never published HS through them.
In 2011 they contacted me since I hadn't bought a book from them in a year letting me know they would sell publishing rights back for $200. I only needed to wait two more years until they were mine for free, but I had some inheritance money and got them out of my life. It took six months to edit and revise it to my liking. It is now available for $.99 at Amazon as an e-book and at Smashwords which sends it out to Pubit, Nook, I-books and other places.
The one real plus from Optimus was the pastor of the house church we started attending read it giving me a glowing review on Amazon. He's also an attorney and when I retired he had a case ready for trial. The first day of my retirement he called me asking if I'd like to work for him. I was retired one whole day. Needless to say P.M. Prescott Enterprises reports more earnings from legal assistance than book sales.
The next post will relate my experience in e-publishing.

Tudorian movies and shows

One of my few remaining blogging buddies Mystery Man of the Shadows has a post about a movie dealing with Henry VIII, and in  a round about way wonders why Hollywood has fixated so much on the time period. To me it's easy: sex, blood, sex, blood repeat often.
I wound up writing a longer comment than his post, which I know is a no-no, but it is my passion.

 Little did H8 know his desire to sire a son would so completely change the course of history. Think about it, no divorce England stays Catholic no King James Version of the Bible. He marries Jane Seymour after Catherine of Aragon dies and when his son Edward VI dies, he's followed by Mary without the Bloody prefix and when she dies without child, Mary Queen of Scots takes over the throne. James becomes King, but as a Catholic and without Puritan interference. See what I mean? No English Reformation, No Virgin Queen, No Spanish Armada, No English Civil War, No Glorious Revolution, No English Bill of Rights, No American Revolution, No Declaration of Independence or Constitution. A Catholic England might not have colonized America until too late to build up the empire it became. A good possibility we'd be speaking Dutch or French.

Here's a list of movies and books on the time period:

A great movie that bombed at the Oscars, eleven nominations and not one statue. Richard Burton got robbed. My favorite line: Anthony Quayle as Cardinal Wolsey: The seat of power does not reside between a woman's legs!
   A little over dramatic leading up to Anne's execution, but it does make the point Henry gave her the opportunity to leave England with Elizabeth, but she chose to die to secure her daughter's claim to the throne.






.

 

Paul Schofied at his best. So many good lines:

Will Roper: Arrest him (Richard Rich),
Moore: What law has he broken?
Roper: God's law.
Moore: Then God can arrest him.

Moore: I would give the Devil himself benefit of law for my own safety's sake

Vanessa Redgrave and Glenda Jackson as formidable adversaries. The sequel by Hal Wallace using the money he made off of Elvis movies, to Anne of the Thousand Days.

Some funny scenes and fantastic performances, but no lines really memorable. Main point was Elizabeth ruled with her head and May ruled with her heart.












BBC followed this with a mini-series with Glenda Jackson called Elizabeth R based on the book Elizabeth the Great by Elizabeth Jenkins.
I agree with Elizabeth Jenkins that Queen Liz was molested as a child and witnessed Katherine Howard being arrested kicking and screaming resulting in her beheading. Sex to her meant death and she would never let a man have that power over her. this series got it right, Elizabeth and Dudley are at a chapel with a priest and she backs out scared to death.
Recently there was another mini-series with Helen Mirren, much more graphic.
Kath Blanchet starred in two movies Elizabeth and Elizabeth the Golden Age that were credible, has the Virgin Queen have an affair with Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester.


BBC had a mini-series on Masterpiece Theater names The Six Wives of Henry the Eighth. I've never seen it, maybe that needs to be corrected if its on Netflix.

TNT did a made for television version of Man For All Season's starring Charelton Heston that followed the play more closely. There are some notable additions not in the movie helping it make sense, but a few quips Schofield put in are left out
.
Shakespeare In Love is set in the time period of Elizabeth and Dame Judy Dench plays a great Queen Bess, but adds little to understanding the politics of the period,

Anonymous which came out a few years ago giving the Oxfordian theory of Edward De Vere being the real writer of Shakespeare's plays is interesting, but so far afield by claiming he was the illegitimate child of Dudley and Elizabeth as to ruin any credence in that theory.
Showtime's series of The Tudors was excellently done even if the actors were too thin for the time period. Like I said earlier lots of sex, blood, sex, blood, repeat often.

Good books on this time period:
Women's romance novels have had a field day in this time period. The most notable for me is My Enemy The Queen by Victoria Holt. A story told by the long suffering wife of Leicester and the mother of Exeter observing all the drama from the sidelines.
The Autobiography of Henry VIII by Margaret George is both a well written fiction with great scholarship, what can sometimes be called fictionalized history because all characters are historical.
Naked to Mine Enemies by Charles Wright Ferguson, a definitive biography on Cardinal Wolsey. I found it a fascinating read, but then I love reading history and it's not everyone's cup of tea.

This is by no means a definitive list of movies or books on this time period just the ones I can think of right now.

In The Works

Next novel going through the publishing process at Create Space. Doing one last final edit and have just done a possible cover.

Sad

A few years ago I had a list of friends to visit on their blogs. I used to meet with two other guys in town that were fellow bloggers and have a dink in a bar once a month. We called ourselves the curmudgeons. My brother started getting everyone in the family blogging so we could keep in touch being scattered all over the place. I'm the last one in the family still on a blog. Bruce shut his down, bummer. I keep up with three blogs now when I used to be able to read blogs for hours. I'm going to shut down all my other blogs but Captain's Log. I still need to vent on some issues from time to time. Kind of sad in a way.

Man of Steel

Went to see the latest in the Superman franchise. First movie to view in 3d. Didn't want to wait three hours for a 2d showing. Not that impressed with 3d. Don't recommend it for fast paced action as it just blurs.
Of all the Superman movies this one has by far the best story line, top actors who give first rate performances instead of phoning it in. Then it devolves into smash and destroy without much redeeming value. I like a Man of Steel who struggles with self control.

Before Yellowstone Explodes

My fourth novel is nearly ready. It is my most ambitious project to date. This literary baby has been so far three years in gestation and the first novel to be multi-generational. I anticipate sending it off for publication by the end of summer. I'm going to try Amazon's Create Space for hard copy publication hoping to have a much better experience than I did with Publish America.

Please leave a comment if you think this is a book you would enjoy.

The novel is entitled The Fan Plan: Before Yellowstone Explodes

What happens when billions of people are hungry and there's no food?
How does humanity survive a volcanic winter without going back to the stone age?

A meteorite hits Northwestern Wyoming on April 1, 1965. The geology department of Trans Global Oil's computer predicts that the magma under Yellowstone will erupt in forty or fifty years caused by this impact. In geologic time from impact to explosion is a split second.
Realizing that when this super volcano explodes the shit is going to hit the fan and billions of people on this planet will die. The Chairman of the Board and President of TGO develop a plan to save civilization and our modern scientific and technological world.
The Fan Plan not only takes measures to ensure food, shelter and energy for the coming ten years of cold and darkness, but a Scientific Secret Police to protect all acquired knowledge, scientists and others from being blamed as the cause of God's wrath to keep humanity from going into another dark age.
Starting in the 1920's when Lyman Drake hits his first gusher in Breckenridge, Texas and creates Trans Global Oil to the 1950's when James Eastman marries Lyman's daughter, Sylvia, and becomes president of TGO to 1965 when the meteor strikes and the three of them develop the Fan Plan; up to 2010 when Patrick Eastman with his half-brothers and sisters with their children continue preparing for the Fan to hit in the predicted year of 2027. The Fan Plan covers the intricacies of an expanding family in an increasingly diverse society, the rise of technology over the last forty years that will aid the pending disaster as well as cultural and political upheavals along the way.