Rhetorical device of Position

Well, here I go again. Let's talk about position, or where you put things in your sentence, or paragraph, or story. I tell my students that it's important to have a good beginning and a good end because that's generally what most people remember. However, if you lose someone in the middle of your story...

"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few". Sir, Winston Churchill.

He catches you with the Never and then finishes you off with the few.

Sometimes by putting what you're writing about last you can create a sensation of suspense. An example: "After the mountainous waves died down, the coast guard launched their life boats." We have to wait until those waves calm down to find out what is going to happen.

You can also mess with minds by putting things out of place. We are creatures of order, but when you put things out of order you can draw attention. Example: "The city, full of noise, strident and discordant, grated on John's nerves." (the two adjectives are out of place and makes you eye stop).

It's something you might use when you want to get attention, but to use it a lot would not be a good idea.

Hope this helps.

Showing versus Telling

"What's the difference between showing and telling a story?"

Just finished "Gulliver's Travels."  I know it was written in a different time for different readers, but I had to force myself to read on.  In comparison to Patrick O'Brian's "Fortune of War," I couldn't put it down.

Difference?  I was told the tale in "Gulliver's Travels," in "Fortune of War,"  I was invited into the narrative.

How do you do that?  The way I've managed it (everyone will have a different method) is to get personally involved with my characters.  Tell it as it is happening and use those moments of narrative to introduce or move the plot from one point to another.

The reason I wrote "Colin and The Rise of The House of Horwood," was because I had such a great time with the Harry Potter series I wanted the feeling to continue.  At every moment in the story I had to ask myself if I was having fun.  There's no sense in writing if you're not enjoying yourself.  I suppose there's writing for therapy, but for that I go for a run.

I sold an e-book!

It was really great getting that notification from Smashwords that I had sold a book!  It's an odd sensation.  You work so hard (sometimes years) getting something where you want it, and then you put it out there and let people decide for themselves.  I think the frightening part, isn't necessarily having someone read my work, but I want them to enjoy it.  Isn't that what the entertainment industry is about -- enjoyment.  If someone learns or is edified along the way, that's wonderful, but there's a certain joy that should be inherent in art of any kind.

You know I remember seeing the film version of "Lord of the Rings," and was disappointed that they left out old Tom Bombadil and Lady Gold Berry.  I know it didn't really fit the flow of the story, and understand why they cut that section, but Tom and those yellow boots had danced through my mind when I was fourteen and left footprints everywhere.

Then there was Alan Burt Akers and his Drey Prescott series.  Why did I love it so much?  I suppose reading about a champion who could handle anything, made me feel a bit better, more capable in dealing with a world I was having a very difficult time handling.

I wonder.  Is this why I insist on writing strong women characters into my stories, because I see too many young women submitting to things they don't have to.

Interesting.

Mike

Cost to the Reader

It has occurred to me, since starting up with Smashwords, that the consumer is being ripped off.
Smashwords is good, they let the author list their own price.  I've always operated under the premise that if the writing is good, it will eventually get read.

But when I go to Kobo, Sony and Amazon and see the prices of their e-books...I am left cold. A lot of their prices are too high.  Where's the overhead?  The cost of production runs?  The distribution fees?  If the author is getting the lion's share of the price, maybe...However, somehow I doubt this is happening.

In my opinion, no ebook should be listed for more than $4.99.  And I think Internet culture shouldn't tolerate higher prices.  I'm all for being rewarded for work hard done, but when an e-book is close in cost to a soft-cover version of the same book...

I'm interested in hearing any thoughts on this.

Prospero's Speech

There are times when the mood comes on me.  A mood of Melancholy, or a mood of awarness, I do not know.
Whalt Whitman was said to have a Cosmic Awarness.  There are moments, times, when I feel this, how the awarness almost becomes overwhelming and I see.  It is the time of poetry.

When blind men see
And deaf men hear
The voice will fly
On wings of wind

Oh, let the dead living
Flesh become enlivened
With the quikening of spirit
To make glorious
Our possibility

Drive these vehicles
Of muscle, bone and sinew
Into the mountains of
Realization

There the shadows
Of the living dead
Dress in animate gowns
And admonish those
Who dance with the finality of fate

We are alive and as
Substantial as the present
And these whisps of possibility
That will be the future

The dead who see
Who hear
Who speak
Stare back at us from
The silver backed mirror
And say

When blind men see
And deaf men hear
The voice will fly
On wings of wind

M.E. Eadie

Adventure

So,  now I have my ebooks available on Smashwords.com. 

They are also available on Amazon.com

I talked to Colin, that's right, Colin as in Colin Hayward in author of "Fluke," and we both think that podio books will be a next adventure.

I also bind my books by hand: hard cover format.  No pain, no gain.  Actually, little monetary gain when you consider how much it costs to mail the stuff.  I also have to be careful not to cut my fingers off.

So, how to put a Pay Pal link on my blog???  I'm sure I'll find out given time.

The other thing I'm working on is to being an Affiliate with Smashwords, which is a fancy way of saying, I list some books on my blog and then you buy them and I get around 11% of the profit.  Whoever put Smashwords together is one smart cookie. 

Now, how do I get people to read my Blog?  Another adventure.

M.E. Eadie

Publishing for free

I've been formatting Colin's novel, "Fluke" so that it can be placed with Smashwords as an ebook.  It's an excellent read.  Primarily the human race has stopped having children and to survive has combined animal DNA with human, and the Fluke is that it worked.

Writing is a strange animal.  Colin Hayward has won awards, but publishers won't pick up his books, why?  No idea, so I started Adam Books.

I'm going to do the same thing for my books.  I'm tempted to make the first ones free on Smashwords, just to get people reading.  I truly believe people are more than capable in making up their minds whether an author has merit or does not.  However, there is this impass that publishers take adavantage of, which is money.

I suppose everybody wants to make it, but really, do we as a society need to be so greedy?  How much does the author see?  Not enough, not by far.  They are the creative genius, not the people who bind it, or market it, or even sell it.  (By the way, I bind my own work, by hand).

The next step is to get my web site.  Adambooks.com up and running, and link up with Smashwords.  I'm already selling "Colin and The Rise of The House of Horwood," on Amazon.com, but really, the price is detrimental: $16.00 plus shipping.  People love to create relationships and associations with writers.  I hope to do this by making "Colin..." free on Smashwords.

Let me know.  Would you read a book electronically, for free, and then order a hard copy if you really liked it?

M.E. Eadie