good books | Jennette Marie Powell

by Jennette, October 13, 2011

It’s an Ohio thing, who knew? I didn’t, that’s for sure! But, I wanted to do a little digging into this so-called “Hallmark holiday” and find out what it’s really all about.

My Sunbird was not a convertible, but looked much like this one otherwise. There's a reason cars are special to me!

See, for me, Sweetest Day is something more. I admit to being cynical about it until 20 years ago, as I was about Valentine’s Day (“holidays that are great for someone who has a Valentine/Sweetest, and make the rest of us feel like crap”). What changed it for me twenty years ago was, I met my husband. Not on Sweetest Day, but on the night before Labor Day.

We met in a bar after a fireworks display. A friend of mine, who knew him through a friend, said hi, introduced us, then be-bopped off to someone else she knew, leaving me there at the table with the guy I had no idea I would marry, and his friend (whom he hasn’t seen since). I got his number planning to have him work on my car, a Pontiac Sunbird with a bad oil leak. I couldn’t afford a repair shop bill – heck, couldn’t afford any repair bill at that moment – but a month later, I had some money saved so I called him.

I dropped off the car on a Monday night. He called the next evening to let me know what was wrong with it (cracked head gasket) and how much the repairs would cost, then we talked for an hour about all kinds of things. When I picked up the car a few days later, I paid him $400 to fix what would have cost three times that (or more) at a shop, and he asked me out for the following Saturday night.

Sweetest Day editorial that appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer in October, 1922 (click to enlarge)

That Saturday was Sweetest Day. He left roses on my doorstep earlier that afternoon, while I was out shopping.

Some sources credit Herbert Birch Kingston for starting Sweetest Day in Cleveland in 1922. His original purpose was to spread some cheer to orphans, elderly shut-ins, and other downtrodden or lonely folks by giving them gifts of candy. Kingston was employed by a candy maker, so there was certainly a commercial component to Sweetest Day’s origins. Other sources claim it was totally commercial, the concoction of a federation of Cleveland area candy industry insiders. Although the initial intention was to encourage people to gift candy to anyone, it’s mostly celebrated in romantic relationships modern-day practice.

So, Sweetest Day is a bit more than just a “Hallmark holiday” for me. (Despite its long history, Valentine’s Day is still pretty much that.) I had never really heard of Sweetest Day before high school (1980), but it turns out it’s been around a lot longer – and it was started in Ohio!

The sources I found all stated that Sweetest Day is still largely celebrated in the Great Lakes states, and not much elsewhere – also something I didn’t know, being a lifelong Ohioan.

Sweetest Day is this Saturday, October 15th. I still don’t know what I’m going to get for my husband. Often, we just go out to dinner, which is what we did on our first date.

Do you do anything for Sweetest Day? Or is it a Hallmark holiday for you (or less)? Do you have a fun story of how you met a significant other? Please share!

Car photo via motorbase.com (unattributed)
Sweetest Day newspaper clipping via Wikipedia.org

by Jennette, October 9, 2011

Sequencing was a challenge (as I knew it would be), and making time to work on this was too. But it’s done!

This week’s goals

1. Last minute sanity check – IOW, note important stuff I’m afraid I’ll forget

2. Dig into the real revisions: going through my notes and actually writing the changes on my manuscript pages. This is Lesson 16 and starting on Lesson 17 of Holly Lisle’s How to Revise Your Novel system. I say “starting on” because the actual cut is brutal, and this manuscript will definitely be more work than either of my last two, and I’m trying to get it done faster, too. Here’s hoping I’ve learned enough to do that.

Several people expressed interest n HTRYN. She’s not currently taking new students, but will be starting on Monday, I believe. I’ll add a direct link when it’s available.

Good luck to everyone participating!

For more info on ROW80, see the “A Round of Words in 80 Days” blog

by Jennette, October 6, 2011

Okay, not a real award, like the Rita, or even the Wrters Digest 100 most useful blogs, but what the heck, it’s fun. You can play too, as long as you play by the rules (at least somewhat):

1. Thank and link to the person who nominates you.

Thanks to my writer friend, Stacy McKitrick! Stacy keeps a fun blog called Stacy’s Rantings and Whatnot, where she ~~rants~~ writes about TV, writing, sports, travel and whatever else strikes her fancy. Check her out!

2. Share seven random facts about you.

Hmm, this one was kinda tricky. I mean, I’m not that interesting. That’s why I make stuff up! So anyway…

Some stuff I like - and some I don't
I hate, I mean loathe, green peppers and celery. I can deal with the latter if it’s cooked, as that takes out the stringy texture and mostly kills the taste, or I pick them out if they’re not tiny, but peppers tend to leech into the surrounding food upon cooking, which pretty much ruins whatever it is for me.
I bought a car. ~~Turned out to be an alien robot, who knew?~~ I ordered it a month before it even went into production. It came with new friends, who knew?
I can curl my tongue, and make the Vulcan “live long and prosper” gesture. It always surprises me that there are people who can’t do this, including my husband and daughter!
Despite my artistic background, I never was able to get into scrapbooking, quilting, knitting, crocheting, or anything like that. I do like sewing clothing, though – I wish I had more time to do it. I’ve made numerous sweatshirts, dresses, hats, slacks, bridesmaid dresses, and even a wedding dress for one of my college roommates. The dress outlasted the marriage, but she’s been happily married to husband #2 for over 10 years now.
I am a Dale Carnegie graduate, which came in really helpful when…
I met my husband at a bar. If not for DCC, I wouldn’t have kept talking when the mutual friend who introduced us be-bopped off to talk to someone else and left me at a table with him. I started dating him after I paid him $400 to fix my car. I figure I’ve gotten my money’s worth – quite a few times over, as we’ve now been married 17 years!
My Earliest Memory
The earliest thing I can remember is going to get my dad’s new car – a ’69 Camaro – when I was 2-1/2. I mostly remember the weird look on my mom’s face when we went to the dealership, which I later found out was because she’d had no idea my dad bought a car! It’s still in the family, too – my brother spent two years restoring it, and it’s beautiful!

3. Pass this Award along to 15 recently discovered blogs and let them know about it!

Well, I’m only going to list a few, as most blogs I follow are mostly about writing. Some of these aren’t so new to me, either. If you’ve already received this award (or don’t do memes like this), you can repeat it, or ignore, no problem. Everyone else – these are some fun blogs I follow that aren’t all about writing, so check them out!

The Evil Jim Winter – Edged in Blue

Athena Grayson

Michele Stegman – Thoughts from a Writer’s Block

Catie Rhodes – Full Tilt Backwoods Boogie

Julie Glover

My Town Monday – a group of writers who collect links from the comments – fun facts about places all over! Anyone can participate, so if you’re looking for blog topics, MTM is a good way to get them – and share!

Woman carrying a basket of bread and vegetables photo via Microsoft Office Clipart

by Jennette, October 5, 2011

I usually don’t get a lot of writing done on Mondays or Tuesdays, because Monday is paperwork night, and both nights are big TV nights for DH. Yet, I managed to knock out my first goal of the week: I finally noted the remaining places in my manuscript where plot holes need to be plugged – yay! There were quite a few, so that’s one revision step that took longer than the week I’d originally planned for it.

That leaves timing and sequencing for the rest of the week for me. If anyone else here has done Holly Lisle’s How to Revise Your Novel workshop, this is Lesson 14 and 15. This is my third book using this system, so I’ve managed to compress it a bit. Anyone else using HTRYN?

Good luck to my #ROW80 peeps!

by Jennette, October 3, 2011

I am taking part in a new writing challenge – well, new to me at least. It’s called Round of Words in 80 Days, and the idea is to set a measurable goal not only for the challenge as a whole, but each week. We report our progress each Sunday and Wednesday, so I’ll be doing that here. If nothing else, it will keep me accountable on my revisions for Time’s Fugitive.

So here goes:

My goals for the 80 days are:

Finish revisions on Time’s Fugitive by November 7, with the ultimate objective of a release by Christmas (although that depends on my beta readers and editors too). I have specific steps to achieve this, so it’s not just a big eat-the-elephant goal.
While Time’s Fugitive is with the beta readers and editor, my goal is to either outline the second half of the book I started for NaNoWriMo 2009 and never finished, or to outline a new Saturn Society novella – I’ll figure out which when the time comes.

This week’s goals are:

Mark where changes are needed in Time’s Fugitive to fix plot holes
Review scene sequence and timing issues, note fixes where needed. This sounds simple, but it’s time travel – with multiple characters traveling in multiple times – so it’s not. Especially since I want it to make sense to readers. 🙂 After all, that’s all of us writers’ ultimate goal, right?

by Jennette, September 22, 2011

It seems ebooks are getting all the press (virtual and otherwise!) lately. Ebooks and e-readers are all the rage – instant gratification! Large type, if you want! More choices! Tons of cheap and even free books! No restrictions on length, whether you’re reading a four-page flash fiction piece, or a tome to rival War and Peace. No e-reader? Read ’em on your phone or even your computer! What’s not to like?

Yet despite all the advantages ebooks offer, plenty of people still prefer to read a good old fashioned paper book. The smell and feel of the paper! Pretty book covers that look cool on your bookshelf or coffee table! Read ’em in the bathtub – and if you drop it, no expensive electronics to replace! Heck, no expensive electronics to buy in the first place! Browse in the bookstore or the library! Used books! No worries about dead batteries! Despite all the gloom-and-doom reports of ever-decreasing sales, paper books are still with us, and aren’t going away any time soon IMO.

Quite a few independent publishers are forgoing print altogether and publishing only in e. After all, print typically involves a setup fee, and print also requires some knowledge of print graphic arts, which is a whole different animal than on-screen graphics. It’s definitely a lot more work to produce a print book, even though the setup fees have gone way down in recent years, and there’s no longer a need to warehouse and ship – Amazon, Barnes & Noble.com, and the like are still happy to fulfill that role for a piece of the action.

Time's Enemy in print - available soon!

Out of all the people I’ve talked to who’ve expressed interest in reading Time’s Enemy, about half of them next ask, “Is it available in print?” So as someone with graphic arts experience, I really have no reason not to offer this, and to that end, I uploaded my book to a printer last Saturday. My proof arrived on Wednesday, I approved it on Thursday, and it should be available on the e-retailers in the next week or so. When that time comes, I’ll announce it here!

So where do print books come from? If you’re an independent publisher, they most likely come from one of two printers: CreateSpace (which is owned by Amazon), or Lightning Source (which is owned by Ingram, the largest print book distributor in the U.S.). CreateSpace (henceforth referred to as CS) is definitely the easier of the two as far as setting up the files for printing, and they have a lower setup fee as well. But Lightning Source (LSI) has some major advantages in other areas, and after some major deliberation, I went with LSI.

Most of these differences won’t be apparent to the reader. One of them is how authors are paid – basically, CS requires a larger portion of the book’s price go to the retailer, meaning the author and publisher make less money, while the reader’s cost doesn’t go down (usually – sometimes the retailers will discount). Books produced by LSI are automatically included in Ingram’s catalog, which may make it easier for them to be ordered by bookstores and libraries.

The most apparent difference – at least with my book – is that LSI offers a matte cover, whereas other print-on-demand providers offer only glossy covers. Until LSI offered it earlier this year, only big publishers’ books had matte covers. A lot of readers probably don’t care, but it gives a book a “richer,” higher quality look and feel IMO.

So what about you – do you notice things like glossy or matte covers? Does the “feel” of a book matter to you? Print-on-demand books are typically printed on heavier paper, which obviously makes the book heavier, but also adds to that “richer” feel. Is this something you notice or care about? Inquiring independent authors and publishers want to know!

by Jennette, September 15, 2011

Time's Fugitive book cover I design my own book covers (sometimes my graphic design background comes in handy), and was pleased to finish this one last week. Time’s Fugitive is the sequel to Time’s Enemy, and is slated for release as an e-book in December. Depending on how print book sales go for Time’s Enemy, Time’s Fugitive will also be released in print, about a month after the digital release.

Covers matter a lot to me, never mind the old saying “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” People do. I know I do. Authors published by big publishing houses usually have little to no input in cover art. There are a lot of bad covers. By “bad,” I mean poorly executed, unreadable, or just plain ugly. They happen to independently-published books and to those from small publishers, but they happen to big-time published books, too – the three-armed woman on Christina Dodd’s Castles in the Air is probably the most classic example. Then there were the notorious, ugly “nekkid Poser people” that seemed to appear on every other erotic ebook for a while. I’m glad that trend went away! Designing my own covers means I don’t have to worry about any of that. If a cover misses the mark, I can easily upload a new one, with the only cost being my time and any stock photos I have to license.

I totally grabbed this book because of the cover!

Even if you’re paying someone, there are some great cover artists who provide wonderful covers for very reasonable fees – I’ve seen as little as $100. I’m not looking for cover art work right now, but if you’re an independent author and you’re looking for cover art, I recommend my cousin and fellow author, Sheri McGathy. Sheri also does copy editing (including mine).

The Writers’ Guide to Epublishing did a good article about cover art a couple weeks ago, and the commenters (mostly or all authors) pretty unanimously agreed that good covers sell books, and bad covers can hinder sales. What do you think? Whether you’re an author or a reader, do you care about cover art? Has a cover ever made you pick up a book (and buy), or conversely, has a book cover ever made you not buy a book you otherwise might have?

by Jennette, September 8, 2011

First of all, thanks to Jim for joining us here, and helping to make the mundane magical! I’ve known Jim for a loooooong time – we met my freshman year in college, <cough> years ago, through a mutual friend. I served as an early sounding board for some of Jim’s early Star Trek fanfic (you knew I’d mention that, didn’t you?:)) and later, as a beta reader for his first efforts at publishing crime fiction. Jim returned the favor and gave me some good advice for Time’s Enemy, and assured me that, yes, Tony indeed thought and acted like a guy.

So let’s dig a little deeper, and take a look at what makes Jim – and his characters – tick:

Jim, you’ve been published before by a small press. Your novel, Northcoast Shakedown, was a crime fic piece that I really enjoyed, even though that’s not a genre I read a lot. Please share your publishing experience with us:

Well, when I signed, the publisher was full of energy, and everyone on the roster became everyone else’s cheerleader. There were some hiccups getting Northcoast out, but it was a fun ride. And at the time, I had some money to spend on travel, so I used that to beef up my networking and get to know authors and booksellers. That first year was fun.

The second year was not so fun, but when any business goes under, there’s no clean way to sever ties. It’s too bad, because I really thought they could do something or be a decent launchpad for a lot of the writers. I think that’s true of a lot of small presses when they overreach. I remember UglyTown did not go quietly, despite both the publishers’ and authors’ best efforts, and Point Blank just sort of faded away. But for a short time in the middle of the last decade, it was a wild ride.

There are two more books featuring Nick Kepler, the protagonist of NCS, both of which I also beta-read and really enjoyed. I remember reading Bad Religion at work during a slow period, and having to restrain myself from laughing out loud. IMO, these books deserve to see publication, and NCS deserves another chance. Now that you’ve gone indie, do you have any plans to (re)release them?

Northcoast will definitely be out later this year. Noir master Ken Bruen wrote me a very nice intro, and I found out it was sitting on a shelf he uses for quotes when he writes. So I was very touched by Ken’s intro. He’s been one of my mentors for years, and I have one project under wraps that will bear his name on the dedication page. I’m not saying which one.

The second book, aptly titled Second Hand Goods, is going to get a rewrite and a fresh edit. I’ve evolved as a writer, and since its collected cyberdust for the last five years, I can look at it a bit more objectively.

Bad Religion is just screaming for some fresh material based on my experiences since the early drafts. I’ll likely downplay Nick and Elaine somewhat to focus on some of the other characters.

Which brings me to your new release, Road Rules. This book has a history of its own, including snagging an agent’s interest. Can you share a bit of that with us?

The seeds of Road Rules have been around for some time. Tim Mason was the earliest. A mutual acquaintance of yours and mine introduced me to this weird coworker. I’d toyed with making him a lawyer in a standalone (picturing Seth Green in the part) and a thorn in Kepler’s side, a role eventually taken by the Eric Teasdale character.

A couple years later, my publisher and I kicked around the road trip idea. I wrote a short sketch about two guys in a stolen Cadillac trying to get to Miami. Tim Mason sort of attached himself to the story.

After I got orphaned, a few friends prodded me into doing NaNoWriMo in 2006. So I fleshed out the story, hit on the idea of the decadent, yet spiritual drug lord, Julian Franco as the cause of all this chaos, and boom! The story demanded to be written.

Road trip stories are always fun! I love your tagline, “The road to hell begins with a stolen car.” But what really pulled me in were the characters. Were there any particular events, places, things you saw/heard/read that inspired the overall premise of the book, its events, or any of the characters?

The route they took was once the “long way home” from Hilton Head, SC, over a few years last decade. And having visited Savannah a few times in the process left me longing to write something set in that city. I still wanted to write about Cleveland, where I-77 begins, so the setting fell together easily.

I saw a few shows on History about holy relics and one of those true crime things about the theft of one such relic. Put those together in a city with a large Slavic population and you get St. Jakob.

Mike is based on years of working in the insurance industry. Maybe too many years. And Cinnamon was part of my desire not to have a bunch of macho white guys hosing the freeway down with testosterone. Plus, instead of the angsty tarnished knight, she’s someone just trying to prove herself.

Back in May, you released your first indie title, a short story called “A Walk in the Rain” (also a good read). What made you decide to go indie?

Well, crime doesn’t really pay well. Of course, I’ve got a short story in West Coast Crime Wave coming out this month from Bstsllr.com, which I did get paid for, but the paying markets are few and far between. I decided to get paid for my short work. I also found out that 1.) It’s the cover, stupid (though content still rules), 2.) people don’t really buy a lot of short fiction on Amazon unless it’s a collection, and 3.) it might help if you actually market an ebook.

(Jennette: A Walk in the Rain is available at Amazon for $0.99.)

Now that you’ve tasted the control and flexibility that comes with indie publishing, are you still pursuing a traditional publishing contract, or perhaps another agent?

I think eventually, I’d like to go traditional, but only under certain circumstances. I’m in a position now where I don’t have to make this a career. So the terms have to be right, and I have to be able to keep control of material I’ve already published. But if the right deal can be worked out, sure, I’ll sign.

Are you planning to offer Road Rules in print?

If enough copies sell, I’ll put it on CreateSpace. If a publisher makes a sweet enough offer, I’ll seriously consider it.

Now that Road Rules is out, what’s next for Jim Winter?

Northcoast, as I said, will be coming out. And the other two Keplers will see revisions and fresh edits. Then there’s my “magnum opus,” which I’ve been reworking since the original draft checked in at 105,000 words.

Thanks again for being here, Jim! And to everyone else, Road Rules is a fantastic, fun read that you owe it to yourself to check out, even if you don’t normally read crime fiction. It’s a fast-paced caper that will keep you reading – and laughing – all the way from Ohio to Georgia, along with Mike, Stan, and Cinnamon. Road Rules is available in your choice of e-formats for a knockout price of $ .99 at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords.

Jim keeps a fun, entertaining blog at http://eviljwinter.wordpress.com where he writes about books, publishing, sports, Cincinnati, technology, and whatever else strikes his fancy.

Anyone have questions for Jim? Feel free to ask, or just comment to say Hi!

by Jennette, September 6, 2011

Longtime friend and crime fiction author Jim Winter is interviewing me on his blog today – please stop in and say hi!

by Jennette, September 1, 2011

My time management plans have been a bit challenging lately. The main reason for this is that I have several ongoing tasks on my plate that each need more time than the allotted hour each evening. Some have fallen off the schedule, except sporadically – email and social media, for example. In some cases, this was unexpected. An upgrade to my accounting software that should have been easy, ended up taking up a whole evening, ending with a lengthy tech support phone call (normally, a last resort for me). All ended up well, as the technician was actually able to help and we finally determined that the download sites I’d tried getting the software from, were both dishing up bad files. Still, that’s three hours I can’t get back.

Treadmill + good stuff to read on my netbook + DUH = Success!

One thing that amazingly hasn’t fallen off the schedule is my physical activity, which for the most part amounts to a thirty-minute interval workout on the treadmill. I’ll be honest here: I hate exercising. I like walking in and of itself, but I don’t like to sweat (which the interval workouts certainly do), I get easily bored, and I get stressed thinking of all the other stuff that needs to be done, that I’d much rather be doing.

So how have I kept it up?

Two things, actually. The first is something I learned several years ago in psychologist/author Margie Lawson‘s wonderful Defeat Self-defeating Behaviors online workshop: The DUH principle.

The DUH principle is pretty simple, and therin lies its beauty. Its three facets are:

Do it first. Or at least, as close to first as possible. I’m sooooo not a morning person, so there’s no getting up early to exercise. Not gonna happen. So my “first” is first thing after I get home from work.
Understand it might not be easy. This part I put out of my mind and Just Do It, even if I don’t feel like it (and I often don’t).
Hurray! Celebrate your progress and success! I mark down my treadmill time in my food and exercise diary on my Android phone, and also on my workout site. I also have a Yahoo goals group, to whom I report my success each week.

The other thing that’s helped me is Make it Fun if at all possible. With a little help from my netbook, the Kindle for PC app, and tons of great books, my exercise time doubles as reading time – something all writers should do anyway. So knowing I’ve got a good book to read just waiting on my netbook is a great incentive, and helps me get past the I-don’t-feel-like-its. It really makes that half hour zip by. Years ago, I tried reading print books on the treadmill. Didn’t work. My treadmill has a book slot on its control panel, but the panel is way too high for me, and it’s too low a slant. It was also a pain to turn pages. The netbook holds the book at the perfect angle, and turning the page is just a tap on the page-down button.

Got any good tips on getting an un-fun task done? Please share! And if you’re having trouble, try the DUH principle – and see if you can make that drudgery fun!

Life and Love in Four Dimensions

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