Finally, a show i have been involved with will see the light of day come January!  We shot this shot back in 2008, but due to limited funds were unable to take it to the next step.

For the past several weeks I have been in the edit suite putting together Gospel’s Dynamic Duets!  Its a “Gospel-Idol” for lack of a better description.  Anyway, you can view the promos for it on youtube.  PLease have a look and let me know what you think!

http://www.youtube.com/mmmgcreativestudios

Lots of stories to go with the production of this show – all kinds of drama!  Maybe I’ll share ‘em soon.

Gospel’s Dynamic Duets – coming to CTS in Canada in January 2010.

So, I have three lovely developments to report:

1. As of today, I am officially a Student Member o f the Editor’s Association of Canada. While I have yet to fully investigate the resources they have available, it looks like they have a veritable bonanza of forums, postings, publications and seminars to take advantage of. Thanks go to Sharon Crawford, who originally suggested I join.
2. A contact called to tell me about a speech-writing opportunity that might be available in the future. More details are pending, but I’m quite excited.
3. I have received some feedback from the author of my first editing project. While she agreed with my decision to rearrange the order of paragraphs to highlight the topic of the article, her reaction to some of my other editing choices was less favourable. In particular, I reworded or deleted words and phrases that have important meanings in the context of the article’s topic, and she’d like me to reincorporate those words. Now, in fairness, I didn’t know some of the terms she was referring to were professionally relevant , or (as in one particular case) that they even existed.

This brings me to a new feature I’d like to introduce as I post more: Lessons Learned. As I make my way through this new industry, I realize that I’m going to need to learn and adapt to the needs of my clients.  So, as I finish projects, I’m going do to little post-mortems to figure out what I did well and what I need to remember next time.  It’ll be our own personal little cheat sheet.

So, what were today’s lessons?

• Be aware of the cultural and professional context in which you are preparing a project. If there are specialized terms that you are not familiar with or words that you think don’t belong, bring them up with the author or project manager, and do the following:
  • Ask the person who has commissioned your work for style guides or references to help you understand the terms in question
  • Make sure to update your style sheet, if you’re using one

In any event, I think today’s been fairly successful. I’ll go over the EAC’s member area in more detail over the weekend, and prepare an application for that very tempting scholarship of theirs that is due on November 30th.

Photo courtesy SXC.

I’ve finally read the synopsis of Leonard Downie Jr. and Michael Schudson’s report, “The Reconstruction of American Journalism, ” in the Columbia Journalism Review, as well as a number of reactions to it. I appreciate that CJR let the authors publish such a rich (30-page!) summary of their 100-page report.

Downie, a former executive editor for the Washington Post and currently a professor of journalism at Arizona State University, and Schudson, a professor of journalism at Columbia University, provide their take on what has led up to the current sad state of affairs at American newspapers, and to a lesser degree, at television and radio stations. They discuss the approaches of a number of new media operations (and are generous with links to the projects in question) and suggest several possible new business/nonprofit support models for the industry.

Whether you end up thinking the authors are offering sage advice to journalists, or are off in left field, you really should read the CJR synopsis or the report. It’s important that those of us working in the media have a say in what happens to our profession in the future, and the only way to do that is to be aware of where we’re at now and what people are doing NOW to adapt to the challenges and opportunities the Internet Era has brought us.

On the plus side

The report largely accepts that Web 2.0 and the other cultural factors that have disrupted American journalism are here to stay and cannot be magically “rolled back” by industry collusion (think simultaneous content firewalls on all major newspaper sites) or government mandate. I know this sounds mean, but this is a good sign!  I have been concerned about the number of journalists—including professors and veteran editors and writers—talking as if the Internet is something that must be, or even can be, “stopped.”

Downie and Schudson present a variety of options for fixing the current situation from across the business spectrum. They discuss multiple variations on publicly funded media, as well as foundation-endowed news projects and hybrid corporate/nonprofit news operations. By doing this, they are acknowledging that one model will not fit all in the future, and that journalists need to consider the context of their news operation or project when devising a funding plan.

The authors rightly identify local news coverage as one of the biggest casualties of the shifts in journalism over the past two decades, and do propose several ideas for reviving it. While local involvement and participation seems to generally be associated with our “bowling alone” culture, there are plenty of people who do care about it, and who now have fewer mainstream media resources for tapping into news about the community they live in.

On the minus side

I immediately noticed that there is almost NO discussion of the fate of the magazine industry, perhaps because that’s what my degree is in (magazine journalism) and because I have worked for nearly all my career as a journalist for magazines—either as a freelancer or a staff writer/editor. I believe that magazines had to face the decline of the so-called “mass media” far earlier than newspapers, after the death of “general interest” magazines such as Look, Collier’s and LIFE in the 1960s and 1970s.

By the time I was taking j-school classes in the 1980s, we were told that starting a magazine was much like starting a restaurant—if you know what you’re doing (business-wise) and can self-fund for part of the first five years in business, you have a good chance of making it. Notice that in that description there is no mention of whether the content (or the food) was any good, if competitors were using unfair tactics, or whether customers were reading (or going out for sit-down dinners) less and less. The focus was on establishing a niche and a business model first and foremost. Paying attention to the market, as well as knowing your craft well enough to produce a quality product, were also assumed parts of that model.

On a related note, Downie and Schuder make huge assumptions about the audience for news content and how they will, or should, behave. To be fair, this is something I’ve noticed over and over again when I read essays of this nature written by newspaper-based journalists. The report doesn’t focus much at all on what readers/viewers/listeners are telling journalists about how they’d like to receive their news, or what sorts of news they’d consider worthy of paying for online.

The authors even go so far as to proclaim that “American society must take some collective responsibility for supporting independent news reporting in this new environment,” and wonder out loud in another section whether journalism is a “significant public good whose diminution requires urgent attention.” These are important issues, but this mindset, coupled with a lack of curiosity or genuine connection to one’s audience, comes across as preachy and pedantic—not the sort of vibe one wants to project to attract supporters to an important cause!

Finally, the report points out one of the largest challenges in journalism’s current crisis—we can’t seem to decide if we’re a profession best suited to entrepreneurial or philanthropic support. I like the fact that the authors include both for-profit and nonprofit approaches to new media, but the way in which they are presented serves to highlight the lack of business sense many of us in the field seem to exhibit. What is it that newspapers do? They’re businesses. Wait, no, maybe we should run them as nonprofits? Wait, maybe we can sell ads and get foundation grants, too?

Late in the CJR synopsis, Downie and Schuder use the term “independent news reporting” fairly specifically, and that’s really what they are concerned about, not so much journalism as an industry or business sector. As they note, “it may not be essential to save any particular news medium … What is paramount is preserving independent, original, credible reporting, whether or not it is popular or profitable, and regardless of the medium in which it appears.” (Emphasis in that passage is mine.)

It bothers me that so many of their suggestions rely on government intervention, although I share their opinion that stronger support for radio and televisions stations receiving money through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would be a good thing. I am a huge fan of public media; however, I also believe that journalistic enterprises can be successful as for-profit businesses. It remains to be seen how that will happen in the future—my feeling is that the “large public” that the authors seek to have journalism’s best work presented to may have already been replaced by a series of balkanized niches, each one hungry for content, but only within a narrow spectrum of interest.

Please use the comment section below to chime in about your reaction to the report, or the state of American journalism in general.

…or ask upperkase.

Another round of edits has hit my desk just as I was indulging in feeling scared and insecure. Bah. At least it takes my mind off breaking my husband’s book shelf and ruining his pants on the day he had an early start at work, a dental appointment and night school. Poor guy.

I should have known better than to expect myself to get any writing done today.  Yesterday was golden, but today?  Today was just as days before long trips always are: a whirlwind of distraction, errands to be run, to-do-list fever.

Yesterday, like I said, went well.  I wrote in three sittings, spread throughout the day.  Some much-needed progress was made, both in plotting and word count.  By the day’s end, I’d completed 2,133 new words¹.

Honestly, I felt particularly victorious with this chunk of words.  I’d been having difficulty figuring out how best to weave the main plot with a couple of subplots, and it finally clicked.  The threads intersected in an organic way that makes total sense; yet again, despite all my planning, my characters surprised me².  Now, the ball has been set in motion for all these brewing conflicts to rear their ugly heads, snarl with a vengeance, and take some painful bites out of my characters.  Then, it will be time for them to figure out how to bandage themselves up and fight back.

So, though I didn’t get any writing done on the novel today, I’m pleased with where I left off.  When we get back from Kansas City, it’ll be time to get my hands dirty once again, and set some serious goals for December.

On that note, Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!  My access to the Internet may be spotty, so I’m not sure how often I’ll get to post this week.  I’ll definitely be back on Monday, though, if not before.  In the meantime, have a great week.  I’m thankful for you all.

PS: The pie in the picture is one I made for my love.  I tried to make a lattice crust, gave up, re-rolled the dough, and came up with something (in my opinion) even more special.  It was so good.  I love pie.

♦

51,710 down | 21,290 to go

♦

¹Still handwritten.  Still enjoying the change.  Hand has not yet withered into an angry ball of bones, so we’re good.  In fact, hand is not even sore.  (Perhaps it would be if I had abused it today, like I did yesterday).

²Though I’m pretty convinced that surprises like this can only happen because of such detailed planning.  I can only swerve confidently away from my original plan since I know my characters so well.

kind of. because nothing’s real until the internet says so, i’m now officially part of the Evil Nerd Empire, a rad publishing outfit that puts out lots of Bizarro and cyberpunk stuff. i’ve edited a couple books for them (Anti-Paladin Blues for Jess Gulbranson and You Morbid Westphal for Steven Rage) so far and now i have my very own bio on their website. yay!

unrelatedly but to spice up this post, here is a picture of david bowie that i found and really like!

I submitted the index and glossary for my book today after approving interior content changes.

Final edits will take place next week and then we’re off to the printing press.

Copies could be available for Christmas!

A brochure is an easy way to spread the word about your business. In your absence, it serves as your business handshake. If you’re there to hand one out, it solidifies the connection by giving your prospects an informative, take-home guide with all your necessary contact info. (DO NOT FORGET TO PUT YOUR CONTACT INFO ON YOUR BROCHURE!)

If you have your designer convert it into a PDF format, you can not only print out your brochure to hand out or use it as a direct-mail piece, but you can also attach the file to e-mails or embed it on your Web site to make it available as an electronic file.

Here are 5 tips to consider when creating a brochure:

1) Know Your Audience. The colors, the fonts, the amount of text, the diction, the layout and the use of testimonials or photos will all depend on the age, education level, taste, habits and needs of your target market. Be sure you think through all these considerations before meeting with your  copywriter and designer.

2) Know How to Hold ‘Em, Know How to Fold ‘Em … Customers and clients may hold and open your brochure a myriad of ways, so you not only have to make sure that you fold it so it opens correctly when unfolded (with the text right-side up), but you also have to put teaser copy on the outside that will make your readers want to open it to learn more.

3) Know Your Ps from Your Qs. It almost goes without saying that you should have an experienced eye proofread your brochure for spelling and grammar missteps. But you should also check it for content. For example, if yours is a more casual target audience, you can be more relaxed on the grammar. Just remember that there is no excuse for typos!

4) Know When to Say When. Sure, that unusual font you found for your headlines on your brochure make it look really unique, but be sure to balance it out by keeping your body copy relatively neutral. The main thing to keep in mind is readability; you are trying to make your message as easy to digest as possible. In order to do this, a balance must be achieved between text and photos, between the use of bolding and italics, and so on. Simplicity is often your most effective tool, so be aware of how many extras you can do without.

5) Know It Like the Back of Your Hand. Your customers may reference your brochure months down the line. It’s important that you know every photo used, for example, so that when someone says, “I want my driveway to look like the one on page 3 of your brochure,” you know exactly what that potential customer is seeing. You can easily accomplish this by keeping a copy of your brochure in your work station for reference when you’re taking phone calls, and tuck one in your bag when you’re out and about in case you have to take a client call on your cell.

Did you know that Saidandsung writes brochure copy with a marketer’s eye? I can also connect you with my design partner if you require a designer for your brochure project. It saves you the step of having to hunt for your own, and we work brilliantly together!

E-mail me or check out my site.

Straight from the pages of Sally Stuart’s Christian Writers’ Market Guide comes our 2010 entry. A lot of people know that I conduct word-of-mouth publicity campaigns, but not as many know that my roots are in freelance editing services. Jasmin and I still offer these services – well, these days it’s mostly Jasmin offering these services. (Which is good news for you – Jasmin’s better than me anyway!) We edit in ABA and CBA markets, fiction and non; emerging lit to Pentecostal/charismatic and everything in between. If you’d like an estimate for editing your manuscript, drop Jasmin an email or leave a comment below. We’re here for your text support.

Raleigh NC. E-mail: jasminis [at] gmail [dot] com. GE/LC/B/NL/SP/WS. Edits: A/SS/F/N/NB/BP/QL/JN/PB/BS/GB/E/D. Has edited for Christian publishers and mainstream curriculum publishers. Developmental editing: $8/pg.; copy editing $6/pg. Requires 50% of fee upfront. Requested revisions are included in original fee.

I’ve commented before about how I see connections between almost everything in my life and writing. Caving? Well, that’s absolutely a metaphor for writing, of course. Scary movies in childhood? Obviously a lesson in recognizing and dealing with avoidance techniques that might be hurting your writing. Lazy and procrastinating? No, no, no—that’s feeding the muse.

And the latest case of life echoing writing work or vice-versa? Electrical upgrades done in your home (while you’re trying to live and work there) is just like editing a novel. It’s an electrifying truth. (Sorry, couldn’t resist!)

I was not happy to hear that my older home needed to have its panel upgraded from 70-amp service to 200-amp service. (Yes, I’m just showing off newly acquired technical lingo.) My house was comfortable and warm. It had (has!) character. I liked it just fine as it was and it never gave any trouble. Current “code” regulations seem a little on the bizarre side: I’m living here, not operating a nuclear plant . . . but I digress. However unhappy I was to hear it, the needed reno wasn’t a surprise. We knew our house needed more power.

I was not happy to hear from my beloved and much trusted, much appreciated first readers that my latest WIP needed more work. Yes, not happy, but again, not surprised. I already knew I wanted to amp up the tension, rewire a few scenes to dim the focus on the killer, spotlight some red herrings . . .

I thought it would be lovely if the very competent electrician could figure out a way to fix the problems without bashing huge holes in my walls and cutting through lovely painted walls and moulding to get at what he needed to address. He, of course, all artistry aside, could not. Fixing the problem required getting at the guts of the house.

I thought, Hey, I’ve edited a lot of novels now. I’ll just cut in neatly, splice in a line of intrigue, throw a couple of exciting switches . . .

I trust you see where this analogy is going. My eight-inch-thick walls were dismembered and unstuffed. My ceiling is, well, missing in chunks . . . My scenes were (are!) just as mangled. So much for artistry.

But there’s good news. All the hard work, the gruelling work, the omigoodness-please-not-really-don’t-make-me-fix-that-too work pays off.

My house was built to last and the new fixtures, forced air electric heaters, and lovely high-powered service, breakers, fuses, etc. just make what was already there that much better—shine that much brighter.

I trust that I won’t have to resort to mudding and taping and painting my novel to get the same power upgrade in my story.

Boy, does upperkase have a treat for you today!

The Globe and Mail’s review of Sarah Palin’s new memoir, Going Rogue. (what a title)

AND

An article published in Vanity Fair back when Palin had just resigned. We feel this shows the true value of competent editing.Who knows what might have happened if she had some intelligent guidance along the way?

Here’s page one.

Thank you, Vanity Fair.

Yesterday I called someone a milquetoast and my friend asked how in the world I knew what that word meant.

It’s random but I love it and it’s one of those words that so accurately describes something that you never even knew how much you would need it before.

One thing I love about English: there is most definitely a word that precisely sums up what you’re trying to express, you just don’t know it.

For instance, did you know there is a word that means “to throw something out the window?” It’s to defenestrate. Or that there’s a word for the investment of mental or emotional energy in a person, object, or idea? That’s cathexis. Oh, how much cathexis I’ve wasted over the years.

How about that a schadenfreude gets enjoyment out of others’ troubles, or that to stultify someone means to cause them to appear stupid, foolish, or absurdly illogical?

God, I really love words.

Related: A list of the 100 most beautiful words in the English language. [via Good]

(BTW, calling someone a milquetoast means they are a timid, meek, unassertive and spineless person who is easily dominated and intimidated. Isn’t that a perfect word?)

Wow! It’s now less than two months that  I have been Blogging daily (excluding a day here and there) and I continue to be grateful for the wonderful growth in readership. Sincere thanks to all of you for your support!!!

There are still six days remaining in November and you’ve blown away the remarkable number of “views” I received in October. November has given us three awesome events and birthday parties for four of our eight grandchildren!
Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

I promise that all of you who email me for autographed books for holiday gifts will receive them within a week of your orders!

Yesterday I didn’t have a birthday picture of Dominic to post. Now I do! Dominic, Happy Eleventh Birthday!

Dominic cutting his cake (11/22/09)

Aggirnato il 24/11/2009: nerolinux, posterazor, gcstar, pysdm, disk-manager, kaffeine,
me-tv, mythtv, partimage, gpaint, glabels, fotowall, usb-imagewriter, sbackup, grsync, FireFox Add-Ons

 

Che cosa è?

Anche se esiste il modo con Wine, e Virtual Box di caricare ed emulare i programmi per windows e Windows stesso, è consigliabile sempre usare quelli sviluppati per linux ed Ubuntu, per ogni programma Windows infatti ne esiste sempre uno alternativo per il sistama Ubuntu.

Perchè faccio questo post?

Per installare i programmi

I Repository

Aggiundere un Repository utile: MEDIBUNTU

Il questo repository di MEDIBUNTU fa però eccezione!

Backup e sincronizzazione di file e cartelle

Internet

• amule - eMule

• filezilla - Client FTP. è già incluso nei repository, solo se non vi accontentate di quello automatico che trovate sia su Firefox che su Nautilus (il gestore di file di Ubuntu).

• gsopcast - Se volete provare la TV via internet.

Masterizzare,  copiare DVD e CD, immagini ISO, ecc..

• nerolinux - Scaricabile dal sito di Nero Burning Rom nella versione demo, acquistabile per poco più di 15€ funziona magnificamente e ha tutte le caratteristiche del Nero Burning Rom classico di Windows.

• acetoneiso - Per convertire immagini ISO e di tutti gli altri formati, per crearli e molto altro. Non è presente nei repository, quindi dovrete scaricarvelo da http://www.acetoneiso.netsons.org/

• brasero - E’ già incluso su Ubuntu, è semplicissimo da usare e con l’uscita elle nuove versioni è sempre più completo.

Registrare i vedeo del proprio desktop

• gtk-recordmydesktop - Per me il migliore, anche se non mi acquisisce l’audio. Già nei repository, trovate la guida QUI.

• xvidcap - Già nei repository, la guida è QUI.

• istanbul - Molto carino, già nei repository, trovate la guida QUI.

Recupero file

• ext3birra - Per il recupero di file cancellati in partizioni ext3.

• foremost - Per il recupero di file generici cancellati. La guida QUI.
  

• Photorec - Recuperare file .jpg cancellati per sbaglio o da una scheda difettosa. La guida QUI.

• recoverjpeg - Per tentare il ricupero di immagini cancellate per sbaglio, la guida QUI.

• testdisk - Anche per il recupero di partizioni cancellate o formattate. Molto completo e con interfaccia grafica ascii, non è difficile da usare ma richiede un minimo di conoscienze tecniche.

Scanner e OCR

• xsane - Già preinstallato su Ubuntu, gestisce lo scanner. Se volete installare anche la funzione per l’OCR (riconoscimento dei caratteri di un testo) installate il pacchetto gorc o tesseract-ocr-ita.

• gorc - Pacchetto aggiuntivo a Xane per utilizzare l’OCR, la guida è QUI.

• tesseract-ocr-ita - Dovrebbe essere il migliore, pacchetto aggiuntivo a Xane per utilizzare l’OCR, la guida è QUI.

Sistema

WebCam

• cheese - Programma molto pratico e funzionale per gestire la WebCam.

• camorama - Gia incluso nei repository, molto completo per gestire la WebCam. Ricordate che linux installa automaticamente la WebCam appena la collegate ma non tutte sono compatibili. Quindi prima di acquistarne una informatevi nel forum di ubuntu su quali acquistare, altrimenti se prendete le marche cinesi per risparmiare poi vi tocca immattire per installarla.

http://blogs.nppa.org/editfoundry/2009/06/22/eye-trace/

I’m in the midst of writing a paper on theories of myth for school. The topic I chose is ridiculously ambitious and more than any reasonable student would have opted to do. But I’m crazy, so, y’know.

There’s a huge amount of information that I’m trying to synthesize, a whole lot of stuff that I want to touch on and talk about, and I’m having a hard time figuring out where to start, and how to organize it all. In order to try to figure it out, I started just writing down ideas and notes and possible configurations. And while it hasn’t quite come together yet, just putting things on paper (and white boards and index cards) has helped me visualize how it’s going to turn out, and in turn, how I’m going to start.

All of which is, as it turns out, a throwback to one of the research resources I’m using for this very paper.

Psychologists Keith Oatley from the University of Toronto and Maja Djikic from Harvard wrote a paper called Writing as Thinking, in which they discuss how putting things into print helps us think. Writing things down externalizes the thoughts, and once they’re externalized and made concrete — unchanging, no longer a chaotic mass of thought within our minds — we can start to manipulate them, consider them from an outside point of view, and generally get the better of them. It allows us to gain new insights on our own thought and take that thought farther.

This is a good thing. I often find myself trying to get somewhere with a particular thought and being unable to do anything with it — always coming back to the same place, going around and around in circles. Externalizing the thought lets me stop that cycle, and go somewhere new with it.

This is certainly what happened while working on my paper. Once I had put some ideas down, I could try to manipulate them, see where they might lead and how they might react with one another.

The same thing happens when I’m writing fiction. When I’m trying to figure out a plot or a character arc, I find it immensely helpful to write it down. Even if it’s just a few thoughts, a few sentences of plot, it lets me look at it from an outside perspective and lets me better connect other, still internalized, thoughts to it. I did this a lot when working on my novel — the plot gets complex at times, and I needed to make sure everything was going to work out how I wanted it to. There’s not enough space in my brain for all those thoughts at once.

So, Oatley and Djikic’s paper helped my research in more than one way. Incidentally, the two scholars — along with a number of others — run a blog at http://www.onfiction.ca/ all about the psychology of fiction and writing.

I now have some idea of what the paper’s going to actually look like. But the mass of information is still giving me trouble. Perhaps I should just start externalizing, just start typing, and see where it takes me. I can always come back and edit.

Win a free analysis and review of your manuscripts from the editors who help writers publish great books. We believe that writers are important, and this is a way to help them write books that others will want to read and buy. This contest is open to all writers who have written or are writing book-length manuscripts, fiction and nonfiction, and are preparing for publication.

Sponsored by Precise Edit and Writer Watchdog.

What winners receive:

Two writers will receive, at no cost, Precise Edit’s manuscript and review service. We will read the book critically, prepare detailed recommendations, and offer advice for improvements.

Who can enter:

Writers with fiction or nonfiction manuscripts and are either seeking publication through traditional or non-traditional means. The final word count of the manuscript must be at least 50,000 words. The manuscript does NOT have to be complete to enter. However, if you win, you will need to finish the manuscript before we can provide the review and analysis service.

What others have said about this service:

Great suggestions! As I reread this piece with your comments in mind, the things you brought up stood right out. These are the kinds of reviews that really help me improve my work. (J. Hoffman, author of WoodWyrm Academy)

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I really appreciated the professional analysis you did on my novel for its second edition. Not only did you understand its complexity, but you managed to suggest changes that would simplify matters for the readers while not sacrificing the essence of the novel’s intertwining themes. (J. Hart, author of Election Dance)

How to enter this contest:

In the comment field for this post, answer the following questions:

1. What is the book about? (3-8 sentences)
2. Fiction: What is the central conflict? (1-2 sentences); Nonfiction: What is the central theme or purpose? (1-2 sentences)
3. Who is the target audience for the book? (1 sentence)
4. Why will this audience read your book? (1-3 sentences)

You may enter through December 31, 2009. Make sure to use a valid e-mail address when posting your submission. We will send you a unique entry number to identify you later in case you win. Your entry will be disqualified if you do not adhere to the above entry requirements. Questions? E-mail Precise Edit owner and chief editor David Bowman: info@preciseedit.com.

How winners will be chosen:

Think of your entry as a publisher query letter. We will evaluate each component of the submission and select the two that in our subjective opinion have appeal, demonstrate understanding of the target market, and have a clearly defined, engaging, and substantial conflict or purpose.

We will make and publish our choices on January 4, 2010, and we will e-mail the authors of winning entries to arrange for their free service.

What non-winning participants receive:

If you don’t win the free Manuscript Review and Analysis, but you decide you want the service, you can get it at a 20% discount just for participating. Entering this contest in no way obligates you to receive any services or engage in any contractual or service agreement with Precise Edit. (The normal price for Manuscript Review and Analysis is $1.50 per page. Non-winning participants who wish to contract for this service may receive it for $1.20 per page. For example: 200 page book x $1.50 = $300; 200 page book x $1.20 = $240.

The not-so-small print:

1. The author maintains all rights to and ownership of the manuscript he or she delivers to Precise Edit for services, either as a winning entry, or as a manuscript for paid services. Please see the Precise Edit privacy notice posted on the Precise Edit website: http://preciseedit.com/Info/Privacyagreement/tabid/104/Default.aspx
2. Winners by default will allow Precise Edit and its representatives to publish or otherwise disseminate their names, manuscript title, and synopsis, similar to that which is posted in submission to this contest. No other contact information (e.g., phone number, e-mail address, mailing address) will be made public, nor will the manuscript be distributed by any means, as noted in the privacy policy. The Precise Edit privacy policy will be in effect for winning entries, other than the information noted in the first sentence of this item.
3. We will not accept manuscripts that promote racism, hate crimes, or violence. These elements may be included in the book, but the book should not espouse them. Erotica is acceptable; pornography is not. All other fiction and non-fiction manuscripts are acceptable. We will not accept poetry.
4. In the event that this contest receives fewer than 20 entries, we may choose, at our discretion, to select only one winning entry.
5. We will accept no entries for this contest by any means other than the process described above.
6. Please note that all entries will be public inasmuch as they are made through the public comments of a public weblog. You accept all risk and liability that may arise out of your participation.
7. If you have difficulty making your contest submission, please contact us for assistance.

Last note:

We look forward to receiving your contest submission. Best wishes to all who participate.

Rules are meant to be broken, so… I started editing. I know that NaNoWriMo lasts the entire month, but I wanted my copy, which extends a ways either side of what I have posted, to be a bit easier to manage. There are a few bits and pieces which were glaringly obvious as I tried to quickly beat it into shape, and I wanted to have something more malleable for the real editing work which is coming up. I also noted where strands tail off, pieces simply don’t fit and – the biggest irk – things that are referred to once and never mentioned again.

I’ll post revisions of the material later, mostly because watching the hundred minute differences between each draft is tedious and I don’t want to spoil surprises, but this update will point out some of the things which I have discovered abut the world I have created for NaNo.

Just Because It’s Cool, Doesn’t Mean It’ll Work

The beginning of the story has bugged me for the better part of a week. I like opening fast, but the random nature of the attack seems a bit too contrived, though I still haven’t worked out the best way to work myself into that scene. Three pages of dialogue didn’t work, a flash-forward to some place near the robot war later on felt too choppy, and I can’t even begin to explain how dull my attempt at injecting asymmetrical game theory into the opening managed to be.

Then I thought about how difficult it was to sell the notion of a homeless brat rising to the top of a major criminal organization in the space of a few years. Despite surrounding him with a bunch of characters who have ties to the Kings it still feels as if the shift is too quick and too unbelievable. I like the notion, but cutting out his story leaves me with a second headache that ties directly into an issue that presented itself later on. But I’m getting ahead of myself…

My political piece was an anti-robot, anti-cyborg manifesto presented by the Senator soon-to-be Vice President Leukman. His thread was basically to build up the DCU as an independent agency outside the normal channels of command. If they acted under specific orders then I would have had to manage hierarchy and their position in the wider policing status of the nameless city (which has gone through a couple of lame names), which would have handcuffed me at the penultimate big event.

Add to the fudging, there is also the issue of “the only sane man” going off the deep end into major insanity too quickly. Selling that plot point with a nanotech-gone-wrong monster just isn’t enough, though I’m not sure what else I could do to drive him insane whilst still being a viable candidate for such a large political role during his death scene. Which is tied in to the issues I was having with Charlie in the later sections.

Chronologically, the next piece of the puzzle which is really annoying me is the five / ten year jump between Charlie being crowned boss of bosses and the introduction of the de facto main character. There are examples of this having worked well, but there aren’t that many connections between the two stories. Talos can’t be moved into the position of the main character, because he really doesn’t do much for large tracts of the story.

The Message Is In The Messages… Honestly…

My attempt to position Charlie into the Kings crime syndicate was for one reason, and one reason alone. He absolutely had to be killed by Adway to bring Talos’ machinations into the open. Talos, as I had sketched out, was sending the detective the texts to get rid of Charlie, riffing off a mentor trope.

Talos deactivated his comm interface, satisfied that Adway would take the necessary steps to remove the increasing problem which Charlie had become.

Clumsy writing, I know…

The content of the messages always bothered me. I can’t have them come out and say that Charlie is behind the meme murders or it’ll look like a set-up, but too obscure and they look like McGuffins. I’m not sure if it can be fixed to any degree of clarity while remaining vague. A puzzler.

I’ve had a couple of comments about Adam’s part in the larger story, and I always intended him to blow himself up, much like the artificial in the blimp segment, but it never quite managed to sit right on the page, and always seems to come up as a sudden turn. I’ve tried a few ways to merge him into the story, first with conversations held between him and Talos via cyberspace, then with him escaping – none of the ideas seem to make his actions more cohesive…

Even when I’m editing in brief spurts – fixing tense, smoothing dialogue, easing in plot points, and slipping in the odd joke – there is the temptation to pull everything apart and do major reconstructive surgery to the novel. I’m trying to avoid heavy editing, but it is really, really difficult…

I’ll write without editing anything tomorrow, I swear.

yet another example of the importance of quality editing.

Recently, someone was complaining to me that the photos they were having printed at a well-known pro-lab were coming out brown toned. 

I asked, “Do you mean ‘muddy’?”

They said muddy was a good description.   They said the colors were all off, dull, and washed out, and so forth.

I recognized right off the bat what they did.  They shot in Adobe RGB and sent the Adobe RGB file off to their lab.  They didn’t tell their lab to convert to sRGB, or the lab’s “color profile”, and so the lab just printed them.  (Remember, your lab will do what you tell them to do.)

Although printers are now coming on the market that support a wide gamut of color space, MOST printers are so much more narrow that Adobe RGB, and Adobe RGB was not designed with photography in mind.  Okay, neither was sRBG, but sRBG is a safer bet when printing.

So, if you do not want to take the time to learn about color management, at least set everything you own to sRGB.  Shoot in sRGB, edit in sRGB, and send it to your lab as a sRBG file.  Yes, it is a smaller color space, but you’ll be more pleased with the results than trying to print an Adobe RBG file.  You other option is to talk to your lab when you submit your files and tell them what color space you used, and ask them to convert.  They MIGHT charge a FEE!  Just beware.

Your other, and better option, is to learn how to manage color profiles.

If only these writers had edited!

Ah, a new post.  And I love the big blue “Publish” button on the right hand side of my screen.  To think!  All the real paper, and ink, and candlelight, and blood, sweat and tears it used to require to publish something.  Thanks to the internet, we can all be published, and published immediately, for better or for worse.

Though I usually love writing, I often struggle with writing at work.  Partly that’s because copywriting is a totally different kind of animal.  There’s no room for stream-of-consciousness, diary-style, emotional downpour in the world of words for money.  You have to sell benefits (NOT features!), be succinct, grab attention, connect with YOU the reader, be witty.  There are rules.  So when I’m not feeling in the zone, copywriting is not all that fun (forget that I had a copywriting business for a few years… lol  but writer’s block falls on the just and unjust alike.)

The other difficult thing about writing at work is just the committee factor.  Granted, I hate having to write something that will go out to the masses without anyone offering me any feedback or even a simple proofread.  But on the other hand, there’s nothing more maddening than 3, 4, 5, 6 or more people continually sending you their edits on a piece.  This happens often at my job.  One is tempted to slap oneself silly when such a process not only happens, but sprawls out across email after email (and they use 4 colors!  Red for deletions, blue for additions, orange… see?  Can’t remember.  I am pretty sure this is why change tracking was developed by the fine folks at Microsoft.)

I also find it funny when people argue with you over something subjective.  Do I just nod my head and agree, or do I fight for my word choice?  I try to go the “I disagree, but no matter…” route as much as possible.  These type of things just aren’t worth fighting over.  I just find it amazing that people feel something subjective can be treated as objective.

Anyway, I’m just a person who loves her job but today is a little frustrated by some of the minutiae that make up a day of work… and I’m not even getting into the REAL details! : )

It is probably because it’s day one of a two-day work week… day two being Tuesday.  And days three through seven being Thanksgiving week vacation time!  My brother and sister-in-law are driving down from Minnesota (they literally live on the river in Fargo, ND, but they live in Minnesota).  (Ooh, I think you need a picture for that.  There you go.  Although I don’t know why the two cities look so far away in the map — they are just one city really.)

Anyway, so all I can think of doing right now is cooking, baking, watching our two dogs play together (cousin dogs!), seeing family, going for walks, sitting near the fireplace, watching the Macy’s parade, watching movies, drinking Miller Lite (heh), playing pool, watching Tom and Michael work on some household projects, uhh… that about sums it up.  Oh, and maybe going down to the Plaza for the big Christmas lighting!  Hopefully no shopping though.  I don’t want to be in a store on Black Friday.

Well this has been cathartic… I’ve realized that my writing/work frustrations, at least on this day, are nothing more than a girl who is longing for a family holiday. lol  See, stream-of-conscious writing is useful after all (but not for selling products!).

May you, whoever and wherever you are, having a happy Thanksgiving.  I am coming to think of Thanksgiving as a holiday that is just as spiritual as Christmas and Hanukkah (if not more… since the retail establishment has yet to totally ransack the fourth Thursday in November.  They can have the fourth Friday — bah humbug).  The starting point for all spirituality, from my humble point of view, is realizing that everything we have is a gift… and basking in that gratitude.  If we can celebrate rather than expect things in life, well then even the most simple thing is a cause for real joy.

(Also, who doesn’t like a holiday that has to do with pilgrims, Indians and the early colonial era? : )

So, I have actually had a good couple of days.  I had a pitch with PitchQ.  They’re a service that records your pitch and posts it online.  I submitted a pitch to a specific call and got to go in and record it without paying the usual fee on the website.  It was a really great experience.  The guy behind the service is really cool, supportive, and open about the process.  He says they accept about 2-3% of the pitches they receive, and then have about a 1% success rate.

He also said if you’ve written a zombie script, you’re in.  Which reminds me that I have that zombie idea that I keep meaning to write about.  It’s actually web series in my mind — but maybe I could Love Actually that thing up.

And I found out last week that I got a promotion — I’ll now be Lead AE on a full season of a reality show, which is exciting.  It won’t start until February, but it’s a decent raise, and an excellent job.  I’ll even get to edit the webisodes, which I am stoked about.  Because I have a strong attachment to the idea that the web is the new distribution method… as soon as it figures out how to do that.

I also watched the entire first season (so far) of Glee.  Which I love.  Like, I want to work on that show because it is everything I love: musical numbers, awkward high schoolers, comically over the top bad guys you love, and occasional really touching and honest moments.  Also, the gayness.  The only thing that would make it better would be otters.

My grandmother’s favorite morning saying doesn’t quite seem to apply to me. I’m not much of a morning person. We were up late last night; hubby watching t.v. and me working on AR. Then I was awakened early (as usual) by a little dog who apparently had to go outside right that minute. And she is so persistent that you simply can’t ignore her. I have to admit that it beats cleaning up a mess. And now she’s being all cute and sleepy in the other chair here beside me so I can’t be too upset with her.

My husband is still sleeping peacefully in the bed. So I’m taking advantage of some time alone this morning so that I can go spend some time with him later on when he gets up.

AR is coming along nicely. I finished Part One last night and began work on the Intro for Part Two. Still feeling strong about this project which is good. Of course it helps that people around me are so supportive of this one. It may be the one that puts me on the map really. I realize this.  Things that are hard to write and controversial end up making the biggest impact. Isn’t that always how it goes?

There are some major turning points coming up for my main character though. I am piecing together ways to present these events. So far everything has come from her perspective. I like this element of this manuscript because it is out of the norm for me. But I’m wondering at this point if my readers are getting enough of the story. There are elements that I am afraid won’t be relayed the way that they should be.

I keep telling myself to finish the draft and find a Beta reader to give me an opinion on it. And maybe I should. I haven’t let anyone read this one so far. Which is funny because my mom is itching to read it. She usually likes my work, not because of me being her daughter, but because I generally write things that she would actually pick up off the shelf to read anyway. And she can be a good Beta reader. Not that I want her to edit it all. But she can tell me if it flows, if elements work, and if it conveys the idea well. I’m sure that it is going to incite a great deal of debate and questions about me for her… I’ve really put a lot of my personal experience into this one.

Anyway, I suppose I should get back to work on the manuscript at this point while I have time to myself.