I'm a writer...in progress

I'm an author, a writer, a person who sits at the keyboard and bleeds words all over a document. It feels so good to admit it, but haven't I always admitted it? I have a blog where I write about my adventures in self publishing. I share my many set backs and my accomplishments. I have a book for sale on amazon (Zombie Bite) and I'm about to have another book available soon, but I don't introduce myself to others as an author. I don't hand out my business cards, or do anything to bring attention to me. It's almost like I'm ashamed to admit that I'm a writer. Why? Do I feel like people will judge me or my work? Well, yes, I do feel like that. Whenever I tell people that I'm a writer I feel like I have to live up to a certain standard. I feel like I can't make mistakes and even my blog has to be 100 percent error free. At work I throw away papers that I've written on if I feel like I may have misspelled a word or that the word doesn't look right written out. I hold myself to such a high standard that I end up hiding this part of myself. Why do I do that? Is it because I get negative comments about the amount of money authors make? Maybe because I had a coworker tell me that there were plenty of writers and there was no way that I could stand out and make a living. Maybe it's because the ex that I thought I would marry showed no interest in my writing. He never once asked to read my writing, and he also never encouraged me (even after I said we should write children's books together based on my dogs). It could also be because I don't think Zombie Bite is very good. I wrote everything but the opening when I was in a dark place. I had just been through a break up and wanted to get it out there because I needed to be successful at something. I regret the way I ended Zombie Bite, but that doesn't mean that I regret writing it. I need to own the fact that I'm a writer, an author, and push myself outside of my comfort zone. I need to pass out business cards in my spare time and promote my books on social media. There will always be people who don't like me or my writing, but that doesn't change the fact that I am a writer and a published author.

Changes

I feel part of writing a successful novel is to have the characters go through changes. To be able to write about changes you have to go through them yourself. Right now I'm going through a lot of changes. Like I said in a past post, my last relationship taught me a lot about life, myself, and what I'm actually looking for. I don't want to dwell on that relationship any longer, but it did make me start changing myself for the better. In many ways that relationship changed me for the worst. Before I started dating him I was very into foreign movies and learning about different cultures, something he was not into. I also really liked video games, but I felt that I couldn't play them with him because he always felt that he had to be the best (he would also rage quit Halo). I always felt the point of playing a game was to enjoy it. I didn't care about winning or beating the game. I just wanted to play something fun. I wanted to have fun with him as well, but I was afraid he wouldn't be happy if I wasn't good at the game. I sat out playing the latest Batman game because of it. I also didn't go back and do all the missions that I wanted on Dead Rising because of it. I also stopped going to school and the gym while with him, things that I should never have done. I'm doing those things again, and rediscovering who I am and learning new things about myself. I'm trying to change in good ways this time, and I'm learning a lot about change and myself along the way.

Picking an author picture

As a self-published author, there's a lot you have to do for yourself. The things you have to do go beyond just writing a book and releasing it to the world. You also have to market the book. Part of marketing is picking out your picture for your author bio. A traditional author has a team helping them pick this, but you don't. The picture above is not the picture I've picked for my author picture, but the only picture I actually had on this new computer. I have been using this picture to represent me on other mediums though. It's a more updated picture than the one I use on here. So why did I pick the picture I use as my author photo? The answer is a bit amusing: It got the most likes on facebook.

Pen Names

Yesterday someone asked me about pen names, so I decided to write this post. A pen name is a name that a author uses for many reasons. In the case of writer's like Stephan King it's because he's releasing so many books at once. In cases like the one with J.K. Rowling, it's because you want to distance yourself from the other work you've done, not because that work is bad, but because you're writing something different. Some writers are told to adopt a pen name if they decide to write a different genre. I can understand because many authors are known for writing within a certain genre like romance, horror, or mystery and anything they write will be assumed to fall into that genre. A lot of authors use pen names for privacy, and that's why I wanted to adopt a pen name. It's harder to pick a name for myself than I thought it would be, so I ended up not picking one. I hope readers will respect my privacy anyway. I plan to write urban fantasy and science fiction, so hopefully I won't have too much trouble marketing my books. Another reason a write could use a pen name is to appeal to a certain audience, which is why J.K. Rowling used her initials when writing Harry Potter. Her literary agent thought boys wouldn't read the Harry Potter books if they knew a woman wrote them, so she had to use her initials. A lot of female authors used male pen names before women were allowed to write, or if they were writing things like horror, which were usually written by men.

Writer's bio

On just about any website where you're listed as a writer, there's a section for a bio. It was easy for me to pick a picture to repesent me as an author. That picture to the side of my blog that features me wearing natural make up and a fight club shirt. The part that I'vebeen struggling with is the "about me" section. I don't really know what to say about myself, and I really don't know what other people would want to know about me. When it comes to talking about myself I'm fairly quiet, which is probably why all of my blogs are so short. I find myself puzzled when wondering what people would want to know about me. I've started and stopped writing a bio hundreds of times, which I find kind of funny because when I was a child I thought it was important for me to write an auto-bio. I can only imagine what it said. My name is Jade, I'm ten and I like Power Rangers. I've looked at other writer's about me sections, and all I managed to find out was that it irks me when someone posts that they are from New Orleans as an attempt to get people to read their books. I have never cared where an author was from, although I used to read all of the about the author sections in my books when I was younger. For some reason I used to read the copyright page too. It should be easy for me to come up with something. My name is Jade, I'm old, and I like Supernatural and Dexter. Oh, I also write books. The truth is, I don't have anything interesting to put in the bio. A lot of authors say something about where they are, if they have kids and a husband or wife they include that as well.They might say something about their education or hobbies. I guess I should try looking at more bios, googling what readers want to know about authors. Maybe I'll just go the same route that I went with my instagram and write, "Insert witty bio here."

An author should never fight with someone on twitter, or facebook

One thing I think an author should never do is fight with another person on social media. It doesn't matter who that person is, or what they say. This morning I logged into twitter and someone had posted a picture of a naked woman. I was shocked, and even more shocked to find that it was an author. There are better ways to sell a book than showing a nude person, like showing off your talent for writing. Anyway, I told the poster that I didn't expect to see that, and his response was for me to unfollow him, which I did. I follow whoever follows me on twitter, so that was the only reason I had followed him. That was also the first I'd seen of his content. Well, the author of the nude book replied, basically making fun of me for not enjoying that sight. That's something that I don't think an author should do. To be honest, she should have ignored me. I just find it unprofessional. It's something you have to learn when you're in the public eye in any way. You have to let things go. You may not like what everyone says, but you shouldn't always reply.

Adult vs. Young Adult

For the past few months, I've struggled to find books I find interesting at Barnes and noble. I did read the Better Off Dead books by HP Mallory lately, but they were such a quick read. bought a few books that kindle suggested to me, but none of them interested me. I also tried reading the Veronica Mars novel (I'm a huge Veronica Mars fan), but that lacked the magic of the series (and so did the movie). I could read books like the Mercy Thompson series, which I haven't finished, but I want something new. I don't normally read young adult. I've tried, but a lot of the books I picked up were poorly written. I did read the ya series by Jesi Lea Ryan lately. I loved both books. It made me think that maybe there are some ya books I should give a chance. I remember being intrigued by the book 13 Reasons Why, and more recently an Alice and Wonderland series that I spotted on a ya table at Barnes and Noble. Today I happened to walk past the book section of walmart. There was a book To All The Boys I've Loved. It's not the type of book I normally read, but I picked it up and read the back. I quickly cracked it open, intrigued by the premise (it made me think of my past relationships and the things I would have said in letters if I knew they weren't going to read them). I was shocked. It didn't seem like a ya book, or not one like I'd read. I knew there were good ya books, The Outsiders, Smack, Speak, etc., but I thought all modern day ya was like Gossip Girl and twilight. I did enjoy the Jesi Lea Ryan novels, so I might pick up a few more ya books. I haven't seen many new adult books that interest me lately. All the ya books on the market remind me of Wolf Within and it's potential to be a great ya book if I edit the heck out of it.

Wolf Within

I think it's time I address wolf within, the story at the top of my blog. Wolf within is a story I wrote when I was in school. I actually wrote it for an assignment. I don't know how I feel about it now, but back when I wrote it I felt like I could make it into a book. I spent so much time in that world, I actually wrote a few chapters. I think with some editing it could be a good YA book, but I haven't looked at it in years. My writing style is different, my thought process is different. When I look back on that piece of writing I think about what I would do differently. For now it just shows me how I've grown.

Pen Name?

I've thought about pen names for a long time. I know a lot of authors have them. Probably most authors at this point. There are many reasons authors chose to have pen names, privacy being one of the top reasons. I wondered for a long time if I should have a pen name. The idea of a pen name seemed promising enough. I don't really share much about myself with people I do know, it would feel funny sharing myself things about myself with people I didn't know. There was also the fact that my last name is unspellable (yes, I know that's not a word, but it sounds trendy) to most people, which would make it harder for me to sell books. I bounced around a lot of names, but in the end I couldn't imagine being called anything else. I wondered if maybe I should just change the last name. I couldn't think of anything I wanted for a last name. The characters I write about seem to name themselves and I can't even think of a name to go by so I can still have my privacy. In the end I decided to go with my first name and only the first few letters of my last name. Maybe someday I'll change my mind. Maybe someday I'll think of something I want to be called, maybe before I publish my first ebook, but for now I can't think of anything that fits me.

My writing corner

It's finally finished! Now my desk looks looks the way I want it to. I still find it pretty funny that this is the desk that I write about werewolves and zombies from.

Blogging is a great tool that I don't know how to use.

I'm sure this translates through the current state of my blog, but I don't know how to blog. I don't know anything about layouts or what content I should include. I have no idea how much I should share. It's hard for me to share information with people I know offline, which makes it even harder to share with people I've never met. Not that anyone is reading this blog. I'd be surprised if anyone looked past the boring layout at all. Most of the traffic I get is probably from people browsing through blogs. This is all my fault. I could devote more time to researching layouts and what content I should include. Blogging is a great tool and can help me reach lots of readers, if I include the right content.

About my ebook

I realize that I haven't posted much about what my ebook is actually going to be about. I guess that's because I'm nervous to share. I actually started writing a zombie story, which I plan to finish, just not now. Then I came across a werewolf story I'd started a long time ago. I reread it and noticed that it had a better storyline. Without another thought I started editing it. I'm really pleased with the way it came together, so I decided that it should be the first ebook I release. So what is it about? Well it's not that short story that I linked to the top of my blog. That story was a school project from when my writing was young and immature. I've grown since then. I might go back and edit/complete that story, but if I do that will be my first young adult fiction. Right now I'm putting the finishing touch on a ebook about a werewolf named Anyssa who works for the FBI, her life is turned upside down when her ex-boyfriend is murdered and she's assigned to find the killer. Right now that's all I can say about it, but I am going to try to aim for a release date late this month or early next month. It all depends on how soon I can get a cover.

Dialog

I took a college fiction writing class at a community college last semester. It was actually more like a fiction reading class with a splash of writing thrown in, since we only did three or four writing assignments and we read about twenty stories. I took this class because I believe you can learn something from everyone, but I learned nothing in this class. Well, nothing the teacher taught me. For our first writing assignment we were told to write a 300 word story that was character vs. nature, character vs. the world, or character vs. supernatural. I went against my better judgement and took the easy way out. I wrote a courtroom scene that was mostly dialog. I thought my teacher would run screaming away from anything I actually wanted to write. I had to filter my writing for fear of being feared. Even tame fiction can be twisted into something that it's not. What I mean is, because of all the violence, school shootings, etc., I was afraid to write a story that I might actually like. An innocent piece of werewolf fiction could be frowned upon in a school setting because of the violent content. When my teacher graded the paper she wrote, "Too much dialog, and it's boring." Maybe not in those words, but she wrote them. The next assignment I turned in had maybe two sentences of dialog, but I wrote more along the lines of what I wanted to write (well, the paper was based on a photograph the teacher had chosen for us). My teacher did enjoy that assignment more, but she didn't love it. For the last assignment we were given a 1000 word limit and no boundries, so I finally decided to write about something I actually wanted to write about. I picked a topic that was more tame than werewolves, but was still something that interested me. This time my teacher actually loved it. I wonder if I had just wrote what I wanted in the first place if I would have actually learned something else.

The struggle to keep characters fresh

I think one of the biggest struggles any author faces is keeping the characters fresh. In your head you think of all these actions you want your characters to carry out, but if your not careful you can make flat characters, or even worse, annoying ones. Today I feel like I need to take a look at my characters. I need to make sure that they are all speaking with their own voices and all have different personalities.