Where I've Been and Tools of the Trade

 I bet you thought I'd forgotten the blog again today. Or blown it off. It's been an intense two weeks. Let me show you what I've been up to (via some pixelated, crappy cell phone photos.)

I've been on the road for the past two weeks to Austin, Texas and back again to chase the eclipse. It was epic. The trip back was fraught with seriously rough weather, slow slogs in the freeways in rain so heavy you couldn't see, and constant emergency alerts firing on the cell phones for flood alerts and tornado warnings (three were verified on the ground.) We got to see an amazing celestial event and lived to tell the tale. 

As to what I use to write: Almost exclusively MS Word - it's familiar, it's versatile, and it's so easily converted to different file types. In the cracks of the caveat I supplied, I turn to simple little low-feature drafting tools from time to time like Omm Writer, Dark Room, or 4theWords. Those are for the days I want no distractions - they're about shutting out the rest of the computer screen and silencing notifications. They're for fast drafting when you don't want to let editor mind engage. There's rudimentary spell checking if there's anything at all.

They all import plain text into Word in a hyper-ugly font but that's fine because there's zilch formatting and Word happily goes about putting squiggly red and blue lines under everything I've mistyped or misspelled or grammatically hacked up. I like to think of Word as the program for the professional author and the other programs for the little kid artist who's trying out bits of story.

Back to the eclipse: We joined a Sky and Telescope Magazine group in the Austin area that had arranged hotel, meals, and the viewing location (private! with security!) We were in the company of 230 astronomy geeks, scientists, astrophysicists, and on eclipse day, one astronaut. We were surrounded by telescopes and massive cameras. All we had were viewing glasses and our cell phones (also with filters applied to them). We really lucked out with the weather.

If you're interested in catching your own eclipse experience, the next one is in Spain (through Sky and Telescope) in 2026. After that, Egypt in 2027, then Australia in 2028. Totality for this eclipse lasted just over 4 minutes. It was the shortest 4 minutes of my life.

Brain Space

 

This week we’re talking about tips for our favorite writing tools. I’d planned to give my best Scrivener tip, but I’m on vacation! 

My time away from home is good for my other favorite writing tool, my brain. Relaxing is good on so many levels. I like to think I’m improving my brain space by watching palm branches away in the breeze. Maybe tomorrow I’ll watch the ant highway again. 

May your week be filled with words and even more, I hope you’re able to give your brain the space it needs to daydream.

Writing Apps: Keeping It Classic

 This Week's Topic: Top Tricks in my Writing Program: What Features Do I Use the Most?

Like Jeffe, I'm a die-hard Microsoft Word user. I blame my time in corporate. Once the office manager (yep, that's who dealt with IT before IT became so complicated it needed a whole department) decided WordPerfect would be replaced by Word, I've been a Word user.  I miss the early versions of white text on a blue screen because it was much easier on my eyes, but I don't miss launching the software by using the DOS Run command. (Yes, I'm old. GET OFF MY LAWN!)

These days, beyond the requisite customized Book Template format and spellcheck, the feature I use a lot is Read Aloud for editing. It's the best way for me to catch missed and repetitious words. It's also great for exposing those sentences I thought were brilliant prose but read as a chunk of WUT??? I'm not particularly in love with their Editor feature because I'm not writing a book report, I'm writing fiction and the grammar AI doesn't grasp the difference. Now, if Microsoft uses a customer-unique AI in Word to grock my writing style--especially if I can train it using my old books--then things could get useful. BUT, but, but, I want that KAK-trained AI to be available only to me, like my customized dictionary is only available to me (see Jeff'es post about the super usefulness of the customized dictionary).

The other advantage of Word is that .docx is the file type both my professional editors use, so we're not wasting time and effort with conversion problems.

Ayup, ayup ayup, nuttin' fancy here. I'm keeping it classy classic.

Jeffe's Top Trick for Fantasy Writing

This week at the SFF Seven, we're talking about the top tricks in our given writing programs.

I don't use a fancy "writing program." I use Word, which I begrudgingly moved to when WordPerfect was murdered. It works great for me. No bells and whistles. I write linearly from beginning to end and don't need extra functions to annotate or move scenes around. Cut and paste works great for this simple gal. I do modify Word to show me the ongoing word count in the lower left corner, but otherwise, I don't have a lot of tricks.

EXCEPT...

This is my top #protip for using Word. It's been the best discovery ever and has saved me loads of time and headaches. Ready?

Use the in-program dictionary to autocorrect your weird fantasy words.

Seriously, smartest thing I ever did. 

For example, in my Twelve Kingdoms world, there is the sailing ship named the Hákyrling. I can never remember how I spelled it (major fantasy-writer peril), nor where I put the stupid accent mark. (WHY DID I USE AN ACCENT MARK??? It's not necessary. It just makes everything more difficult. Anyway...) So, I added Hákyrling to the dictionary - which is easy, right click on the word and choose "Add to Dictionary" - and then I went into the autocorrect options and added that if I type "kyr" Word autocorrects it to Hákyrling. With italicized formatting. Boom. Done. That easy. 

I have done this for many of my more complex/obscure fantasy names and words. The trick is to pick a shortcut that 1) you can easily remember, and 2) you don't otherwise type. 

Go forth and use this trick, young fantasy writers!

 

Anthology Cover Reveal!

Beyond the Veil Anthology - Pre-order now!

If I may paraphrase Lord Alfred Tennyson: In the spring an author's fancy lightly turns to anthology publications! I'm excited to be a part of Carnal Imprint's fall anthology, Beyond the Veil. This steamy fae romance collection of 9 stories has a theme very close to my heart - feathers and wings! My story is the second in my series of bird-shifter romantasy set in a version of medieval Andalusia. 

The Cover Reveal is today, so that is why I've thrown over the Worst Return on ROI topic. However, I think anthology participation can be hit or miss--worst returns are when the anthology and/or author group explodes, while the positive intangible returns (as Jeffe put it in her post earlier this week) of joining a group of like-minded authors and sharing the experience--and time and money--of a published work can be very high. I've participated in a couple of really wonderful experiences like this, but I also have at least one negative experience. Don't get me started on that one.

Last year, I joined the Bound in Magic anthology with a gorgeous group of up-and-coming fantasy romance authors. What a treat! I had too many commitments to contribute to this year's follow-up, but I've already secured my (pre-ordered) copy. I'm going to take it on my spring mini-holiday next month so I can savour it.

What anthologies have you read lately? Tell us in the comments!

The ABC's of Writing

ROI: Return On Investment

This week we’re talking about our worst ROI’s. Don’t think you’ve invested anything yet? You’re a writer, so at any stage of the game you’ve already invested your time. Hopefully it’s been well spent, though it could be argued that the hours sucked into various socials is a terrible ROI if it’s keept you from writing. 

But what's my worst ROI? I’m not too far into my writing career and so I haven't had many opportunities to be wise or unwise. No cases of books hiding under the bed. Though by the time I have a book available in print I'm going to be so excited I expect it'll be hard to stop myself from ordering them! 

So far I've invested in a few different things. The editing dollars I put into The Mars Strain before my turn in date to Recorded Books was well worth it. I count every conference I’ve attended as wise investmenets because at each one I’ve connected with new writers—and we all know that writer friends can be lifelines. And I spend money on my website…but I don’t think I can call that a bad decision because it’s a landing page for people looking me up. I view it as one of those business requirements. 

When I look at what I’ve put into my writing career the number one investment is my time. I’ve poured hours and hours into writing, thinking about writing, blogging about writing, and reading about writing. A day doesn’t go by where I’m putting words to screen or thinking about the words that I will string together the next time I sit down to type. 

As an example I’ll share the hours I put into two of my first drafts. 

Dark Queen’s Daughter (fantasy complete at approx. 83,000 words) = 329.75 hours

Fisyk (sci-fi thriller at approx. 65,000 words) = 230.9 hours

I’ve kept word count spreadsheets for the last three manuscripts I’ve written, but only the last two had a column for hours per day. It’s a column I’ve decided to keep in my future trackers. I like being able to see how many hours per day were spent creating and then correlate them to time of day and word count total. But again, it’s all total time invested no matter how many words are being put down.

And on that note I bring you a blast from the past, April of 2022, and the image that surfaces in my mind whenever I catch myself wasting precious writing time: 

James A. Moore’s words of wisdom will endure even though he has passed from this world. So if you need the nudge, get that ass back in the chair and write. 

James's friend, Christopher Golden has organized a fund raiser to help offset Memorial Expenses and to support James's widow. It is still live if you wish to give.

ROI Ouch

This Week's Topic:  Worst ROI Ever 

The list of low/bad Returns on Investment (ROI) in which I've engaged is long. Whether the returns I'm measuring are cash or brand awareness, there have been some painfully wasteful lessons learned. In some instances, the investment of time far exceeded the returns (hello, social media, looking at you). In others, the hundreds of dollars in cash investment earned less than $5 of return. Those instances can be split between CPC Ads and email-blast companies. 

ROI on ads is a struggle for anyone selling anything, from indies to MNCs, so I don't weep over those losses. Curse? Yes. Sadz? No. I expect losses there; I even budget for them. 

Email-blast companies, on the other hand, I expect more from since bumping up my sales is their core business. The leader in the space, BookBub, is worth the investment for free or $0.99 books in my genres. Higher than that, and my ROI becomes a loss. There are other, smaller blast companies whom I've paid and received nothing. Not one sale, not sales page hit, not one website hit. Not even crickets were aware of the promotion. Sometimes I've had to go eight clicks deep into a blast company's site before getting to a sales link for my purchased placement. Ooof. Yeah, yeah, the blame's on me for not investigating that better before purchasing. Because I'm generous, I'll share my mistakes to save you some $$ and heartburn.

Before buying placement in an email blast, do a bit of due diligence. Check for reports of:

• Crappy Creative
• Are they using your book's cover? Are they using the image with proper ratio/sizing (or is it cropped, stretched, blurred, etc.)? What about the accompanying text? Is there any? Who is writing it? Who approves it? 
• Inflated subscriber numbers
• They're not outright lying about how many accounts have subscribed (though unscrupulous businesses could be), but they're not including how many accounts are bots or how many unsubscribes they have.
• Email open-rate is lower than the industry average
• Few blast companies report their open-rates under the protection of proprietary info.  Anecdotal information should give you a clue.
• Expanded inventory w/o notification and cancellation options
• This is a problem because it lowers the value of the purchased placement--aka instead of placement as 1 of 5 promotions in the email, the placement is 1 of 25 promotions.
• Misleading Marketing Messaging
• They promote themselves as an email-blast company, but the fine print on their website never explicitly states that your book and its buy link will be in that email. Instead, your book's info is lumped under a larger promotion (e.g. This Week's Fantasy Discounts) and buried more than 1 click off the email.  
• They upsell additional placements within their brand (social media pages, website, genre-bundles, etc.) with the classic "increase visibility up to XX%." That "up to" is a deliberate vaguery meant to disguise that what you're buying isn't worth bupkiss.
• Non-Consent Backblast
• The absolute worst sitch is buying placement with a blast company whose email list is built on harvested and/or non-opt-in addresses. Not only do you lose money, but you also lose reputation. This can happen with startups and companies under new management, so triple check before buying.

Admittedly,  I have eagerly supported the underdog/new businesses competing against the big guys and lost money (but not reputation).  Yes, I knew the risk I was taking equated to my purchase being on par with a charity donation. However, those risks were ones I could afford to make. 

As always, adhere to the golden rule of marketing and investments: 

Never spend more than you can afford to lose. 

Calculating ROI - and Accounting for the Intangible

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is our worst ROI ever. So many to choose from!

ROI is industry shorthand for Return on Investment. It's basically a calculation for financial health of a business. I looked up the origin and found out that Donaldson Brown created the term.

As the Assistant Treasurer [of DuPont] in 1914, Brown developed a formula for monitoring business performance that combined earnings, working capital, and investments in plants and property into a single measure that he termed “return on investment.” It later became known in academic and financial circles as the DuPont Method (or Model) for Return on Investment. The measure was widely taught in business schools and adopted by many companies as a means of benchmarking the financial health of their products and businesses.

That's interesting, because I wondered if it was an old model. Turns out it's over a century old!

Also, the term comprises much more than I think most writers mean when they use it. When I hear writers talk about ROI, it's always whether a particular effort - a conference, buying an ad, buying into an anthology - will be more expensive than the sales it generates. Many reduced it to the simplest math: "If I spend this much attending a con, will I earn more than that on sales of my books?" Often husbands are cited as putting forth this equation, usually as justification for wives not attending cons.

When asked for my opinion there (and sometimes even when NOT asked), I have always said that conferences of all types provide an intangible ROI. Networking and getting your books in front of people give long-term results that aren't always quantifiable. Since I was doing a bit of research, I looked up if anyone thinks the DuPont Model for ROI is antiquated. Turns out there's this:

We demonstrate that firms 'assets are becoming increasing more intangible, and the traditional DuPont Analysis omits this crucial piece of a firm's ability to generate profit.

Those folks are talking market equity, but it occurs to me that many authors looking at simple math and short-term sales are failing to account for the intangible value of building recognition for their work over the long term. 

But I digress. 

The topic today asks about my personal worst return on investment. Since I don't really do the calculations - see above - I don't know a precise metric. I can, however, share an investment regret. When my very first book came out, the essay collection Wyoming Trucks, True Love, and the Weather Channel, a friend of mine, Chuck, told me one of HIS great regrets was not buying a case of his first book. The first edition was worth a great deal and he was sorry not to have done that. So, I bought a case of my books!

Reader: I still have most of them.

See, my first book didn't sell tons of copies and I have not become an NYT bestseller with a TV miniseries based on my books, unlike Chuck. He meant well, and I adore him for thinking that I would have the same trajectory, but I'm not C.J. Box, alas! 

I suppose the key takeaway here is that there is no one size fits all advice. 

Also, that the ROI on cats is always solid.