Author Topic: Sci-fi novel now available from DC member kyrathaba! (Read 464809 times)

mouser · « **Reply #450 on:** July 13, 2013, 02:10 PM »

I'm going to offer the first 50% of the book as a free preview on Smashwords.

i don't think there is any reason not to make 50% of the book available for those that want it --
HOWEVER, there is probably some real value in using a very short preview to those who want to get a flavor of it.

too often we neglect the fact that people become easily overwhelmed by information, and we are particularly vulnerable to this when we are the creators and are intimately familiar with the content.

i'd encourage you to consider having one of your proofreaders pick out a very short section (1 chapter? 5 pages?) that best captures the flavor/feel of the work, and use that small excerpt for these kinds of previews.

then if you want to make 50% or 75% of the book downloadable on your homepage, that's another matter and seems fine.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #451 on:** July 13, 2013, 02:27 PM »

Yeah, I know what you mean, mouser.

We'll let you guys pick out some "flavor text" from two or three exciting scenes. Those will come after "Blurbs" and before "Title Page".

Smashwords creator Mark Coker has done extensive research showing that books priced at $2.99 and 50% preview sell the best, even better than $0.99 price-point.

Once the novel is published, I'll make a large portion of it available to hook the reader (I have already had over 200 individuals read Prologue through Ch. 4 and most tell me that the Prologue stirs their interest but that the ending of Ch. 4 is where they really got hooked.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #452 on:** July 13, 2013, 04:31 PM »

Sent first 10 pages as a query to Jason Allen Ashlock of Movable Type to see if he finds it interesting. Cause ya just never know...

kyrathaba · « **Reply #453 on:** July 15, 2013, 10:21 AM »

I have sent Perry an email with the completed manuscript for the novel. It weighs in at 72,164 words of actual story (excludes front-/back-matter). This is a full-length novel. Smashwords defines 50K+ as full, but most publishers like to see novels in the 70-80K words range.

I apologize to Perry and 4wd for going ahead and working on the manuscript, because I'd said I'd pause until we caught up with proofing the existing material. But when inspiration struck, I had to get it written while it was fresh in my mind. Hope my two proofreaders will forgive me.

Now, over the next few days, Perry, 4wd, and I will continue to work jointly using Google Docs as a realtime online collaboration tool, to ferret out typos, misplaced commas, missing quotation marks, etc.

I hope to have the proofed book to mouser as a .mobi file within a few days. Being realistic, it may be 10-14 days (Perry or 4wd may increase that estimate, but I think we can do it in that time frame).

I also have four previously published authors who have agreed to accept a gratis ebook copy to read and review/blurb.

Stay tuned...

Samples downloaded

From DC hosting: 207
From Scribd: 37 reads, 50 followers
From Issuu: 4 reads, 113 impressions, 1 Like

Total words (front-matter + heart of the novel + back-matter): 73,322

Blurbs page: 185 words
Title/Copyright: 21 words
Dedication: 106 words
Acknowledgments: 30 words
Smashwords License Notes: 85 words
Epigraph: 4 words
Quote: 18 words
-------------------------------------
Front Matter: 449 words

Afterword: 719
-------------------------------------
Back Matter: 719 words

Main body of book (excludes front-/back-matter):
73,332 - 449 (front-matter) - 719 (back-matter) = 72,164 words

kyrathaba · « **Reply #454 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:01 PM »

Got this in my email: checked it out. Might be cool, but it looks to me like they're in it to make money off self-publishers. I'm not interested in laying out any cash.

4wd · « **Reply #455 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:01 PM »

I apologize to Perry and 4wd for going ahead and working on the manuscript, because I'd said I'd pause until we caught up with proofing the existing material. But when inspiration struck, I had to get it written while it was fresh in my mind. Hope my two proofreaders will forgive me.
-kyrathaba (July 15, 2013, 10:21 AM)

No need, I was going to tell you to keep going today

It's also better this way due to the time difference, another reason that it would have good to have someone from USA/EU also.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #456 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:05 PM »

Not too late, we just don't seem to have any takers.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #457 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:12 PM »

Perry and 4wd, I'm gonna do a read-through on my tablet's Kindle app. I seem to spot errors easier that way. I'll coordinate my fixing of the manuscript with updating the Google Doc (you guys will have already spotted the errors anyway, most likely). Tomorrow, I'm taking my dad to another city to see a couple of specialists, but I should be able to dig into the Google Doc over the next few days.

I was thinking of the following excerpt being placed before the blurbs on the first page, to snag the browsing shopper. What do you think?

The alien almost danced upon his tentacles, so pleasurable were the psychic emanations of terror pouring off of Eddie Hasser. Veins pulsed in its head, torso, and each massive tentacle. The alien snaked closer to Hasser, who had run out of breath, and was leaning forward, holding his gloved hands against the sharp pain in his chest. The man’s eyes bulged, and his mouth formed a helpless “O”.
“Let’s see if we can increase your terror without killing you,” the creature crooned. It’s head deformed and then quickly reformed into a bulbous, hooded thing that, as it turned out, Eddie Hasser’s heart couldn’t tolerate. The good doctor collapsed forward, helmeted head bouncing once on the corrugated aluminum mesh floor.

wraith808 · « **Reply #458 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:18 PM »

As someone who has *not* read (so indicative of one of your potential readers, perhaps), that wouldn't entice me. I think in most of those cases, those blurbs (1) give you an idea of the book- which that one does to an extent, but not as much as I think it should, and (2) get you wondering about what's going on- many times with a cliffhanger at the end.

Of course, that's just my humble opinion, but I figured I'd offer it.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #459 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:34 PM »

I draw a distinction between a blurb and an excerpt. I meant the above as an excerpt, but perhaps something like the following would give a better overall idea of the book:

170 years from now, aliens decimate Earth. A relative handful of humans survive, hidden in deep subterranean enclaves that offer some protection from surface radiation. Although the main attack is now seven years in the past, one alien ship remains in orbit, and the conquerors are not content merely to let humanity lick its wounds. See the depths of courage and ingenuity this crisis brings out in the heroes of post-apocalyptic Earth.

wraith808 · « **Reply #460 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:37 PM »

I understood what you meant

You meant the excerpt that people put in (or used to put in... I've seen a lot without them lately) that will get you started reading.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #461 on:** July 15, 2013, 06:59 PM »

Oh, okay, you did understand my meaning

Yeah, I'm thinking of just putting something brief at the very beginning to summarize the book, kind of like paperback's have on the back cover.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #462 on:** July 15, 2013, 08:18 PM »

Perry and 4wd, went through Prologue to Ch 10 and actioned every comment, bringing my Jutoh manuscript into line. Will pick back up at beginning of Chapter 11, hopefully tomorrow.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #463 on:** July 16, 2013, 08:27 AM »

Beta version has been sent to proofreaders.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #464 on:** July 16, 2013, 08:51 AM »

Beta-readers:

I just found an error in Prologue:

>> “The hardware we’ve got down here is, as you might expect, even better than what I programmed on at MIT, before The Attack. Suddenly he shot Byron a grin.

Missing quotation mark after "Attack". Fixed.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #465 on:** July 16, 2013, 08:56 AM »

>>He grunted in remembrance. and sat back down.

Fix:

He grunted in remembrance, and sat back down.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #466 on:** July 16, 2013, 10:35 AM »

Beta-readers, I have read Prologue through end of Chapter 2 and found a few very minor issues. As you read, please make note of any issues you discover or aren't sure about, and we'll compare them once we get my updated Epub converted to RTF and uploaded to the Google Docs working document.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #467 on:** July 16, 2013, 10:56 AM »

Yikes, near beginning of Ch. 3, found "skull" misspelled "skll". Fixed.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #468 on:** July 16, 2013, 07:01 PM »

I've completed my cull through Prologue, Ch. 1, Ch. 2, Ch. 3, and Ch. 4. Beginning Chapter 5.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #469 on:** July 16, 2013, 08:17 PM »

Chapter 5 done. Whew, that was a long one!

kyrathaba · « **Reply #470 on:** July 16, 2013, 09:28 PM »

Chapter 6 done. Found a sentence repeated

Will start with Chapter 7 tomorrow.

Perry Mowbray · « **Reply #471 on:** July 17, 2013, 12:07 AM »

Chapter 6 done. Found a sentence repeated

Will start with Chapter 7 tomorrow.
-kyrathaba (July 16, 2013, 09:28 PM)

I took down the previous version and am waiting until you've ready to give me the next version

4wd · « **Reply #472 on:** July 17, 2013, 05:06 AM »

I took down the previous version and am waiting until you've ready to give me the next version
-Perry Mowbray (July 17, 2013, 12:07 AM)

Guess I'll just keep reading then....

kyrathaba · « **Reply #473 on:** July 17, 2013, 07:24 AM »

Here's what I posted yesterday on my FB author page:

As you know, the first draft of a story or novel is called the rough draft. We took my rough draft and scoured it for errors (typos, grammatical, logical, etc). This resulted in the 2nd draft. Now, I'm reading the 2nd draft cover to cover and making edits, polishing, leaving some stuff on the Cutting Room floor. When I'm done, we'll have the 3rd draft. This will be the Release Candidate. Me, my two proofreaders, and some beta-readers will decide if anything further needs tweaking, and then I'll publish. I'm currently up to Chapter 6 in this process.

kyrathaba · « **Reply #474 on:** July 17, 2013, 07:47 AM »

Chapter 7 culled. Beginning Chapter 8.