Indie Author Network

I live in many places but this is one of my favourites. We are a collection of Indie Authors, Artists & Editors who work to support each other in our endeavours. The nicest bunch of people you could ever wish to meet.  Check out my page and have a wander around the site, you'll find some good books to read and much more. Enjoy.

Carol Wills Author -       Indie Author Network

Carol x

The Birth of Titus the Blue Tit

Someone asked me the other day, where I got the idea to write my children's stories about this little bird called Titus. I guess the original idea came from watching the garden birds. One day I was just staring out the window, [as you do when bored] and saw some Wrens creating a nest and getting harassed by a Blue Tit as they flitted about.

Ping!! the what if bell rang and turned into a flash story called 'New Neighbours' that's in my collection 'Five Minute Fiction'.  Then while trying to entertain my grand children one day, I created a verbal story about this little Blue Tit called Titus who got into trouble try to visit a friend. I'd never thought of writing for children but my grandchildren liked the story so I thought why not.

I spent a lot of time playing around with 'Titus' not sure if I had what it takes to be a writer of kids stuff. I'm a writer of flash fiction, I don't write novels. What makes me think I'd be any good at writing for kids? So, I read up on the subject of writing for children. Boy did that confuse me, people say it's hard to get the tone right and even harder to use the right language level for kids, and the list of doe's and don'ts is as long as your arm.

What to do? Well, I went on line and found a writing forum, joined in with the chat about writing and when I felt comfortable, I posted my little story for some feedback. I got a lot of constructive criticism and used the feedback to improve the story. Then came the big test. I needed to show it to my peers, and get some face to face feedback.

Although I'd read it to all the family and anyone else who stood still long enough, I still wasn't sure. After all they were my family and friends, who would always say nice thing about my writing wouldn't they? I mean, they wouldn't want to upset me, with the truth would they? I guess we writers all go through this uncertainty about our work, don't we?

I belonged to a creative writing group in my home town at the time and tentatively showed it to the group. Although they were a friendly group I knew I could rely on them to tell me the truth. One by one they said it was good or they would read it to their kids etc. Wow! I was pumped. Then, one member [a teacher of 5-7 year olds] said, would I like her to read it to her class and get some feedback from the kids. Would I? I snatched her hand off.

Back to my teacher friend, it was a hit, her class loved it. They especially liked the bits about the bugs, well, kids always love buggy stuff don't they?  Titus was born and became 'A Titus Adventure' with beautiful illustrations by the wonderful artist Barbara Shore. At first I thought it was a one off, but it got such good reviews when I published it, I thought maybe I can do another.

I now have three 'Titus' stories published, two are self-published as A Titus Adventure and  Titus and the Magic Feather I also have Titus stories  in collections published by The Peacock Writers in aid of children's charities. Titus and his Adventure with Cedric and Santa is in a Whimsical Holiday for Children  and Tius and the Magic Feather is in The Rain Clouds Gifts  Titus and his Adventures with Cedric and Santa will be published as a stand alone with illustrations by Barbara Shore in time for Christmas. All Titus stories are paperback as well as e-books.

About The Peacock Writers
An on line group I belong to had the idea of writing a book for children's charities and called for submissions. This turned into The Peacock Writer of which I am a very proud member. Two or three times a year we get together and write a themed book for children and all royalties go to various children's charities.

The Peacock Writers have written and published two book to date, the first had a Christmas/winter theme and the second a rainbow/spring theme.  We have another in the pipeline for Halloween/autumn and there will be a 'Titus story in that too.

Carol x

The Peacock Writers are Recruiting

The Peacock Writers are  a group of writer who come together three or four times a year to write for children's charities. Here's a note from my very good friend Paula Shene who is like myself a founder member of The Peacock Writers.

From Paula Shene  at Paul and Paula's Place

If we thought last month was busy, this month got off to a plunge into new adventures of editing, writing, publishing, promoting, and social interaction.

The Rain Cloud's Gift written for Children's Charities by our group The Peacock Writers' is on it's way to the NYC BOOK FAIR at the JACOB JAVIT'S CONVENTION CENTER. No mass books or signing, just books displayed for industry professionals, stars, editors, publicists, publishers, and acquisition teams for the movie industry. Gwenna D'Young has an Angel who was so impressed with the book, and has given us the money and backing to have the book appear in the line up. We are also in the process of releasing a full, pictures included, limited edition.

Our next book in this series will celebrate the fall season and we are recruiting writers {1 each} from India, Japan, and Philippines - America has Halloween and Thanksgiving, Great Britain has Guy Fawkes - we would like stories that reflect fall traditions or holidays for these other cultures as well. The stories would remain the sole property of the author and their use as a donation would only occur for the book collection for Children's Charities. The story is to be written on a level where a child could either read it or have it read to them - our age goal for readers is 0 through 12. 

Please leave a comment on this link which will take you to Paul & Paula's Place, if you are interested in being considered.
Carol x

New Titus Adventure

Hi all, just wanted to let you all know I have a new Titus Adventures book on sale in both e-book and paperback. This one is Titus and the Magic Feather. Barbara Shore has outdone herself with the illustrations on this one, here's just a few. 

The story is about Titus’s friend Hamlet who is a Great Dane. Hamlet gets kidnapped or rather dog-napped and Titus along with his friends goes to the rescue.

Here’s the paperback link:

https://www.createspace.com/3875905

If you prefer to buy from Amazon, they tell me the paperback will be on there soon.

The e-book is available on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Titus-Magic-Feather-Adventures-ebook/dp/B0083GFVSE/

However, unless you have Kindle Fire the images will be in black and white.

Enjoy!

Carol x

Idea Theft!!

What do you do when you think someone has stolen your story ideas? After all, there is a saying that there are only six basic story ideas in the world; so did our own ideas come from one of them? Of course they did.

However, if you write a story from an idea that just seemed to pop into you head, then some time later (and I stress the 'sometime later' point here) find someone has used that idea to create another story somewhat different but still the same basic plot and ending, should it make you mad? Damn right, it should!

Then when you find that same person has used another of your ideas, well, it's downright cheeky in my opinion. People who steal story idea just go to prove they have no imagination. So it begs the question; are all their stories unoriginal? I think it does, there is an old saying 'monkey see, monkey do' and people without original thoughts or idea will always jump on a good one; if they think they can make a buck or two out of them.

Read this excerpt from a news article by Associated Press:

LOS ANGELES — “Pirates of the Caribbean.” “The Matrix.” “The Last Samurai.” “Broken Flowers.” “Amistad.”

Success isn’t all these films have in common. Each was also challenged by a lawsuit claiming “idea theft” — a common Hollywood problem that lawyers say is likely to continue as long as huge movie studios wield enormous power.

But why would movie studios, with every resource at their disposal, steal stories? Are these writers just cranks, frustrated wannabes with delusions of creativity?

No, says attorney John Marder, who specializes in representing aggrieved writers. Many are victims of a system that favors studios and networks and offers little protection for writers and ideas.

“It’s a small group of people that have all the juice, and if you’re not in that crowd, you’re really at their mercy,” he says. “There’s a real lack of moral compass on the issue in Hollywood. And there’s an ego-driven arrogance about it, like how dare you challenge this producer, this director, this studio? They’ll spend $10 million fighting a case where the demand is $100,000.”
 

So, lets go back to the original question. What do you do? Well, unfortunately you can do nothing unless the story is a direct rip-off. By that, I mean, it would be plagiarism if it were your story with just minor changes. If it's just the plot idea; however close to your plot, there is no legal redress.

Nevertheless, you can make a noise. Shout about it from the rooftops, write about it on your blog, and post in writers forums. Just be sure to mention no names or the story in question because you might find yourself on the wrong end of a lawsuit.

Carol x

What the Kindle Forums are saying about us Indies

While checking my offerings on Amazon I had a wander through the Kindle forums. This is my take on what they had to say about us Indi authors.

The number one complaint seems to be about typos.

It's one of my pet hates too, if you can't afford an editor make sure you turn on the inbuilt spell & grammar checker in your word processing package. Yes, I know this is basic but it's surprising how many don't activate the grammar check. Trust me it does work, and if you get funny squiggly lines under the word or sentence it's because you've done something wrong. Don't just ignore it, keep working at it until you lose the squiggle I promise it will make the sentence sound better. Eventually.

If you're still not sure it's spelt right or looks odd, use the thesaurus to check for synonyms (alternative words), you'd be amazed how many times I've done that and found I was using the wrong spelling of a word to describe something. Oh, and watch for missing words, this usually happens when you're editing for the nth time, 'can't see the woods for the trees' syndrome. Don't give the Kindle trolls grist for their mill,

The second complaint was about homophones.

Now, I must confess I had no idea what a homophone was but I do now, it’s just a technical term for something I’ve always known, and I have to admit they have driven me mad when I see them in a book. For those like myself who have lived most of their life in ignorance of the technical term homophone, they are words that sound the same but are spelt differently and have different meanings IE: there/their, your/you're, hair/hare, break/brake, flower/flour, night/knight, affect/effect.

The list is long so if you don't know the correct spelling for the sentence you are writing, look up homophones on line, there are plenty of sites 'spelling 'it out. Don't get too down about this I've read books by famous authors with incorrect or missing words. However, because we are self published we need to think like the women pioneers in a male dominated job, we need to be better than the established authors to rise to the top.

Number three was dubious reviews.

It seems they don't like it if we get too many 5 star reviews because they think we get our friends and family to use reviews as propaganda to improve our sales. Well, as we know, friends and family will always give a good review, although my family haven't so far... :( So, what do we do about our love ones?

I suppose we could always be as honest as one author I read, he commented below the review that it was from a friend. His frank disclosure was refreshing so I bought the book. You could always ask some of those loved ones to give 3 & 4 star reviews, though I doubt they'd be able to force their finger down the star list. Maybe I'll try that, if any of my family or friends, ever get round to giving me a review.

Number four was cover art.

Apparently, according to the trolls, too few Indi’s take the time to obtain a good cover for their book. We all know the saying 'don't judge a book by it's cover' but the trolls are turned off by some of our covers. Ok, this again comes down to cost, and not all of us can afford to employ cover artist.

Of course, you might just be capable of doing it yourself, so think about exchanging skills with another writer. Do you need an editor? Offer to do a cover for their book, and they return the favour.

The only other thing I can think of to combat this is, to capture a geek. Awww! come on people, we all know a geek of some sort, ask around and pick the youngest one, they are the most clued in. They often do it free for the kudos. Just promise them a credit in the book, and don't forget to follow through on your promise. Having said all that, I don't judge a book by its cover, I mostly go by the blurb so make sure it's a killer.

So there we have it, the top four complaints from the Kindle Trolls. Check your books my friends and let's make them the best they can be, our reputation depends in it.

Carol x

PS One of my characters has escaped http://tinyurl.com/bojx2zg