Derry, Northern Ireland

Derry, Northern Ireland
A book I'm working on is set in this town.

Monday, December 2, 2013

Updates and reworks...

I read through the instructions from Lightning Source, but somehow missed the part where you have to have the PDF you submit already formatted into a 6x9 page or they bump it. And yet the images, even though they're being saved to a b&w pdf, still have color structures instead of black and white. Which makes no sense to me, but apparently does to techies. So I had to rework the book...and it increased to 96 pages. Making my spine fatter, too, so I had to redo the cover. I think I have it like they want it, now...but I guess I'll find out, tomorrow.

Truth be told, I like how it looks in 6x9. The words are a bit larger and the text cleaner-looking. And the images fell neatly into place with only a little jiggering. Of course, you never know until you actually see it. I had everything exactly like Create Space wanted it for Bobby Carapisi, The Complete Novel but the cover still came out off by 1/16".

I'm almost excited about the book...and trying not to get too expectant. But I wrote the first draft of this nearly 25 years ago. It was a lot shorter -- 40 pages, if I remember right -- and Little, Brown & Co. was interested in it, but only if I'd cut the story to 14 pages. I trimmed it down to 28 but couldn't go any lower and make it work. So that fell apart. Since then, it's been one of those projects I couldn't quite get back to...until I posted it on my blog. Then it began working on me, again.

I hope it does well and people like it. But I thought The Lyons' Den would be my breakthrough novel and it's sold worse than just about anything else I've written. You never know with your own work.

Just heard Tom Daly's acknowledged he's dating a boy. No big surprise, but I'm happy he's happy. The majority of people are supportive, but what's interesting is how many are turning on him for it.

No better than an animal is man, at times.

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