Writing a fantasy novel is hard work. The world is very different from a tech noir cyberpunk setting in the future of grydscaen. There are constraints to the world and some of the descriptions have to be different. You cannot say something is tall like a skyscraper unless you are writing urban fantasy set in the current world. The setting for “The Seer of Grace and Fire” includes magic and technology which will be closely related to alchemy so there…..
Over the past few days I have been doing the planning necessary for worldbuilding as I create the world of Arenth in my head. The difference between this book and others is that I have done some plotting. I think you call it “plotter” who plots things out and has an outline to follow, and the other is “pantser” which is flying by the seat of your pants and let the writing take you where you are going to go. Usually…..
On today’s On Writing we talk about waiting for galleys in the production process of getting grydscaen: dissonance published. So I just turned the manuscript in on Wednesday of last week to the publisher. The manuscript is evaluated and then if accepted endorsed to production. During the production phase the Microsoft Word document which is the manuscript is turned into a galley. Also the cover art is finalized and put into the cover template. The design of the grydscaen books…..
Today in our On Writing series I wanted to talk about cover art. We will use the cover for grydscaen: dissonance the new book in the series which I drew as the example and also talk about commissioning artists for covers as well. So you might say this is sort of a cover reveal even though this is just the line art before it gets coloured. Cover Illustration: Commissioning an Artist First lets talk about finding an artist. You can…..
So I turned in the manuscript for grydscaen: dissonance today to the publisher after spending the entire day editing the manuscript. I took one of the tips from my On Writing: General Editing Tips blog post. I shortened the sentances in the entire manuscript. It took me from 8AM to 3PM to get through the 40,000+ book. I was off work today so I could actually spend the whole day working on the book. I don’t usually take days off…..
So I wrote a post last week about not having ever used an editor. We are about to publish the book grydscaen: dissonance and I am toying with actually getting an editor. Luckily my publisher has editing services so it will not be difficult to find an editor. I was worried about having to find someone in the wild which could be a shady business. Now I have been through the new book dissonance 3 times already and am getting…..
Today on our segment on writing I wanted to talk about the editing process that I use. For me I have an undergraduate degree in English which focused on comparative literature and creative writing. I also have a background from work in technical writing and translation so this gives me a little edge in the editing department. By no means am I the grammar police but I can do a pretty decent critique for flow and wording. The editing process…..
So I wanted to start a serial segment on writing, like my segment on making manga and the Friday segment Packrat Underground. So here we go. I have been watching some Writer Podcasts recently regarding marketing, editing, running a writer business and self publishing. I was revisiting grydscaen: tribute as I think about getting the book professionally edited or farming it out to beta readers. I don’t have beta readers at this point and I don’t know really how to…..
I wanted to talk about cover design for the grydscaen series today. As a writer mainly I went to art school to study animation and game design which allowed me to focus directly on character designs and animation for grydscaen. There were a few character sketches, storyboards, animations and backgrounds, as well as 3D art done for grydscaen. This was why I went to get a better grasp on my art work. I do all the cover art and interior…..
So grydscaen is an indie published book series. I work with an indie publisher and I also publish short stories from the series using Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. So I wanted to talk a little about both of those processes for a moment. Lets start with grydscaen: insurrection which was the last book published. I type the manuscript using MS Word and give it some formatting with margins and chapter headings as well as informational pages and a dedication. I…..