Poisonous or Venomous? Sorry it has been so long between posts, but I had the unfortunate luck to have experienced two heart attacks and two strokes last year, and all within a few weeks. And no, they weren’t the result of a poisonous or venomous snake. It kept me in the hospital for four months, […]
I’m Having A Very, Very, Very Bad Day Have you ever taken a hard look at the word very? I’m not talking about the use of very as an adjective, or even the use of very as an adverb meaning “truly” or “the actual fact”. I’m referring to the very we hear every day, many times a day—very […]
Markdown Spices Up Your Writing Markdown was developed by John Gruber. Markdown is a text-to-HTML conversion tool for web writers. Markdown allows you to write using an easy-to-read, easy-to-write plain text format, then convert it to structurally valid XHTML (or HTML). The above was taken from Gruber’s website. I shied away from trying Markdown for a […]
Don’t Ignore The Copy Editor If you’ve ever wondered what a copy editor can do for you, you’re not alone. It’s a decision that thousands of self-published authors face each day, and many of them choose not to engage a pro. I think that’s a decision made on budget and not on common sense. I’ve put […]
It’s Easy to Proofread On An iPad If you’ve ever wondered how to edit books on an iPad, you should read this post. If you use Scrivener, this will definitely make your life easier. (This might also work with some of the other ebook reading software. I don’t own a Kindle or Nook, so I […]
Even If It’s Fiction—Should Writers Lie? I read a review on one of my books the other day, and the person found it unbelievable that 6-year-old kids were drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes, and using foul language. Mind you, these scenes took place 30+ years ago, and in an ethnic neighborhood in the city. But this wasn’t the […]
Will a Casual Profile Picture Doom Me To Mediocrity? When I first uploaded my profile picture on LinkedIn, I had a number of friends and associates tell me, in no uncertain terms, that I should use a different one. “Something more professional,” they said. I’m not one to ignore advice without checking, so I looked […]
One Last Lesson From Coffee Dog This is the third post I’ve done about Coffee Dog. The first was back in January, 2013. It was simply titled, Coffee Dog. The second one I wrote six months later. I called that one, A Lesson From Coffee Dog. Each of those posts were difficult to write due to the circumstances. […]
Launch of A Bullet From Dominic I’m thrilled to announce the long-awaited launch of my new mystery book— A Bullet From Dominic, the sequel to A Bullet For Carlos, in the Blood Flows South series. A Bullet From Dominic features Detective Connie Gianelli and Tip Denton, with a special appearance by Hector “Ribs” Delgado, who you will recognize from Necessary […]
CreateSpace VS Ingram Spark Print Book Distribution Last week I did the first part of this comparison. You can view it here. This week concludes the post. Weighing the Other Factors Any time that you are comparing services and products, it turns out to be far more complex than you thought it was going to […]
