CreateSpace and Amazon's Pitch 2.0: Completely Worth It

So, last night, I attended a free event put on by CreateSpace and Amazon called Pitch 2.0. It very nearly didn’t happen, and I’ll be paying dearly for it for the next three days, but it was totally worth it. It was even worth the rush hour traffic on the 520 bridge, which locals know is the kind of hell you usually only associate with cities like L.A. and New York.

I took copious notes and I’ll be blogging about it for some time to come, starting soon (probably as soon as work finishes making me pay for my pleasure). The main thing I took away was this: publishing has changed, and independent authors have some fantastic resources available to them now. I’ve been seriously considering the whole self-publishing route for some time. Unless circumstances change, this event has pretty much convinced me that this is the right choice for my books. I’m not interested in spending years trying to get them traditionally published after finishing them. I want them in the hands of my readers ASAP. And with the tools available now, those books won’t lack for anything in the product quality department. The only possible failing may be the author herself, but I’ll be doing my utmost to make sure the contents match the beautiful, professional packaging.

A lot of excellent information came out of this event: help with pitches, marketing, distributing, and various other topics. We won’t lack for Dojo material, I can tell you.

I can also tell you that if CreateSpace and Amazon throw one of these little soirees in your neighborhood, get your ass registered and attend, no matter what it takes. It was worth several months’ worth of perusing the best writing blogs out there. Not that you shouldn’t be doing that, too, but there’s nothing like an event like this for helping you become a better author and, if you wish, your own publisher.

CreateSpace and Amazon's Pitch 2.0: Completely Worth It
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Warning: Fencesitters and Bystanders May Be Affected

At the risk of inviting a miasma of socks, I am going to talk about Womanspace once again. It’s important, and I’ve got a point to make.

There are a couple of open letters that are worth reading. Dr. O’s An open letter to Dr. Rybicki makes a very important point:

Maybe your short story isn’t the biggest issue out there concerning sexism, but it’s the little issues that are frequently the most dangerous. Little slights, which appear innocent enough on the surface, permeate our thoughts and actions without our conscious permission and ultimately DO have consequences, whether we intend for them to or not.

And when your small act of sexism, intentional or otherwise, ends up published in a venue the size of Nature, it has an outsize effect. This is why women and men spoke out. Silence would imply the issue is unimportant. It’s most certainly not. As any scientist who also happens to be a woman whether a culture of sexism harms, and chances are excellent she will tell you it does.

Of course, this wasn’t the worst act of sexism ever perpetrated in the entire history of civilization. And it would have probably died quite quietly if the author had possessed the humility and courage to utter just two words.

I’d have liked it if he had. But he chose to pour gasoline rather than balm, and we all know what happens when someone starts a fire on the internet. I’m not sorry it happened. Many excellent posts came out of it. Nature got put on notice, and so did anyone else who might have thought that a little light sexism was quite all right. Dust-ups like this raise awareness. And I want to talk about why that’s important.

Continue reading “Warning: Fencesitters and Bystanders May Be Affected”

Warning: Fencesitters and Bystanders May Be Affected

Okay, So This Is Only the Greatest Plate Tectonics Song Ever

I didn’t know this song existed 5 minutes ago. Then I pulled up YouTube, saw it in the “recommended,” and decided what the hell. Now it’s one of my favorite geology songs of all times.

Watch the video. Just don’t do so in a place where peals of laughter are frowned upon, i.e. at funerals, during wedding ceremonies, or if you work for a humorless corporation.

Okay, So This Is Only the Greatest Plate Tectonics Song Ever

Dana's Dojo: "It's This Big and It's Blue"

Today in the Dojo: Getting a handle on stories that don’t quite know what they are.

 

There was this cliché at the bookstore chain I worked for, eons ago when things like chain bookstores in malls still existed. Customers would come in all the time, collar one of the booksellers, and burble, “I need this book! I don’t remember the title, the author, or what it was about, but it’s this big and it’s blue!” About the only thing that changed in the parade of people coming in for the book whose subject, author and title weren’t recalled was the relative size indicated by their desperately waving hands. It happened so often that the manager of one of our stores, upon hearing this request for the billionth time, joked, “Oh, yes, I know that book. It’s right over there in our this-big-and-blue section.”

Continue reading “Dana's Dojo: "It's This Big and It's Blue"”

Dana's Dojo: "It's This Big and It's Blue"

Los Links 12/2

Okay, yes, I know, this is extremely late, and I’m sorry. I truly am. But during the time I was supposed to be compiling Los Links, my Muse decided it was time for us to have some, ah, special moments. And who am I to refuse her?

So we nearly filled a notebook, just about killed a pen, and my hands are busy informing me today that writer’s cramp is a very real thing, and they have got it. I’m behind on everything. I missed Geology Office Hours. I didn’t get to watch Doctor Who. But I’m not bloody complaining, because the work we did serves two novellas and the novel, I’m starting to see how the pieces fit, and it’s bloody exciting is what it is.

And I chased her off with a stick this afternoon so I could get Los Links done for you. I’d like to thank Rebecca Watson, Greta Christina, and PZ Myers for their Skepticon IV talks, which I’ve been listening to in the sunshine all afternoon whilst I copy and paste shit. Granted, it means copying and pasting shit took a lot longer than it should have because I kept breaking off to watch bits, but it was fun and informative and I wouldn’t trade it for anything except several million dollars, because then I could quit my job, actually keep up on writing AND the blog AND watch their talks anyway.

Where were we? Oh, right, you wanted links. Here they are, then:

Continue reading “Los Links 12/2”

Los Links 12/2

That'll Be Me. In a Book. A Paper One, Even

So, I’m in the midst of a frantic day of playing catch-up, I glance at my email, and I see this thing that says “Welcome to Open Lab 2012.” And for a moment, I’m not really absorbing that. I’m like, “I didn’t sign up for any conferences yet. Oh, hey, there’s an email from the folks who’re doing that pitch workshop tomorrow night that work doesn’t want me to go to because poor planning on their part constitutes an emergency on my part, and… ZOMG WTF?”

Oh. Right. Open Lab’s not a conference, it’s an anthology. One that Chris Rowan nominated me for (yeah, saw right through that innocent whistle, buddy). So I open the email, and it’s got all this verbiage about how “Adorers of the Good Science of Rock-breaking” has been accepted and here’s a contract and some edits and professional author stuff. Oh, and we need these rights so it can be published world-wide.

What?!

They are going to chop down trees and make them into paper and print my words on it, and then bind that paper together with paper that has got words from rock-star quality science bloggers on it, and they’ll put all those pages in a nice cover and release it to the world next fall, and I still can’t quite believe that’s actually taking place. I’ll probably be clutching that book, looking at my by-line, and still not believing this is actually taking place. I’ll have to find a good psychiatrist before then. That way, I’ll have a professional specializing in the treatment of psychiatric disorders assuring me that I haven’t had a psychotic break.

On the assumption that I have not, actually, had a psychotic break, thank you! Thank you, Chris Rowan, for nominating me. Thank you, my friends in the geoblogosphere, for inspiring me. Thank you, my readers, for giving me a reason to write words down and post them. Thank you, Open Lab, for briefly taking leave of your senses and choosing that post of mine for inclusion. Thank you, everyone who believed I wrote words worthy of this.

Now, if one of you happens to live in the Seattle area, would you kindly drop by and give me a rather large pinch?

That'll Be Me. In a Book. A Paper One, Even

It Was the Best of News, It Was the Worst of News

And with that melodramatic Dickensonian post title, I shall now announce nothing much of substance. Aren’t you glad you clicked over? I knew you were.

The good news is, having mostly finished my blog reading backlog, Los Links will be fat and sassy this week. The bad news is, I still have to compose it. Good news: I’ve got some old school Doctor Who to watch, during which links shall be linked. Bad news: my brain is so fried after several hours of solid reading that it’s oozing gently from my ears, which means Maclargehuge Post Containing Actual Substance and a Quote by Ed Yong Hisownself shall be delayed. Sorry.

The good news is, I called my mother whilst walking over to Quiznos for some sustenance, and she sounds miles better. Very nearly as good as she gets. Good enough that I could broach the topic of her signing a release so her doctors can share information with me, and she didn’t freak out, but thought it was a brilliant idea. The bad news: good times don’t last. We just savor them while they do, and do our best to ensure there’s more good than bad, which isn’t such a bad thing after all. Every life is a matter of trying to extract more good than bad, and we haven’t done so badly, overall.

The good news: kitteh and I eschewed the living room for the bedroom today, where beautiful bouncing sunshine leapt through the windows. The bad news: that bloody bouncing sunshine woke me up. Argh. And now it’s close to setting. Double argh. The good news: I write best in the dark.

And speaking of writing, I have got good news on that front: I’ve been beavering away steadily on ye olde WIP. The bad news: I had to return to the notebooks to figure out why the story stalled. The good news: I have made what seems to be a breakthrough, and may be able to wrestle some story out of what seemed like a pile of disjointed words. Bonus good news: I’ve filled quite a few notebook pages with useful thoughts. The bad news: I forgot to stop by Staples to replenish the notebook supply. The good news: Staples is close by.

And that’s about where life is at the moment. Now for the really bad news, the worst possible: it’s laundry day.

I shall see ye for Los Links if the pile of dirty clothes doesn’t eat me.

It Was the Best of News, It Was the Worst of News

Sunday Song: Niobeth

Still reading, I’m afraid. I’ve got something full o’ substance planned, and if all goes well, I’ll be able to write it up tomorrow. It has got Ed Yong in it. I cannot begin to tell you how pleased I am about that.

In the meantime, since many of you seem to be enjoying songs, I figured I’d share one of my favorite finds.

This may be one of my favorite things ever. I love the song itself, I love the video, I love the feeling it leaves me with. I think I want to spend the rest of my life with it, although it’s probably too early to make that kind of commitment.

What say you all?

Sunday Song: Niobeth

Saturday Song: Hayley Westenra

If I don’t get some reading done soon, there won’t be any Los Links. So I’m going to throw a song at you and run. I found this whilst spelunking YouTube for new-to-me music, and it surprised me. I’d somehow assumed from something else I’d stumbled across that her music was kind of light and pop, but no – we’ve got this gorgeous, dark, classically-influenced delight:

Right. This is your cue to talk about the music you love.

Saturday Song: Hayley Westenra

Educating a Professor

Science is complicated. Experts in one field may have only passing acquaintance with another, and can get things rather wrong when they step outside their comfort zone. Case in point:

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/glacial_till/status/142406581416497153″]

Now, mind you, this wouldn’t be much of an issue – yes, a professor shouldn’t be spreading misinformation, but we all get things wrong sometimes. But this gentleman, when advised that it’s heat from the mantle that drives plate tectonics, and that said heat is the result of radioactive decay, did not say, “Whoops, my bad.” He doubled down and claimed that the Moon’s gravitational pull is still the main driving force. Considering how minuscule that tug is, there’s no way it could generate so much heat. Yet this educator seems to think the Moon is Jupiter, we’re Io, and about a dozen professional geologists taking him to school on Twitter are wrong.

Perhaps the BBC can educate him.

And then…

And there you have it.

Now that we’ve had our class with yummy Scottish accents and sweeping visuals, I believe we should indulge in a sing-song.

 

Educating a Professor