I have enrolled my novels, Questionable Interests and Taken Apart in KDP Select at Amazon. They will be available through the KDP Select Lending Library within the next few hours and will be available for the next 90 days, free of charge.
My novel, It Happens Every Day will be free for three days, beginning Friday and ending Sunday. As usual, I expect hundreds of readers to snap the book up during the promotion; just as they have the other books I have sold for no charge.
What is it about free stuff that turns people into penny-pinching curmudgeons? What real difference does it make if they spend $.99 cts on a book, as opposed to getting it for free? Maybe if I price my books at the rates dictated by the Agency Model, more readers would buy them. I mean, I know my books are good or so many people wouldn't have bought them over the past couple of years, and so many wouldn't be grabbing them when they are promoted as free. Are readers just that cheap? In the old days, Amazon let us price our books as low as $.49 cts, or even free for as long as we wanted. Then Jobs and the Big Five publishers came riding in on their tanks and forced Amazon to accept the Agency Model in pricing of books. Suddenly the Indie Publishers, (like me)were being passed over if our books were inexpensively priced and our work wasn't promoted by Amazon at all, while books published by the Big Five were taking front and center place in the promotions. At their exorbitant prices I might add.
Let's face it; e-books cost next to nothing to publish and the Big Five are charging as much for an e-book as they charge for a paperback, a trade-paperback, or even a hardcover copy. But some readers seem to equate quality with price. For that reason, I believe I will begin slowly increasing the prices of my books. I doubt that I will ever price them as much as a paperback, but perhaps readers will be more attracted to them if they cost more. Bless their contradictory natures.
Thank you,
Derek A. (Wings) Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, The Empty Heart, Congruencies and more.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
My writing style and content
Yes, I know my style is somewhat quirky in the placement of the ellipses, but they denote passage of time or change of location or pace.
As for the content; well, the content isn't always everyone's cup of tea. However, many of my readers have said that though the content wasn't what they were accustomed to and not what they usually looked for in a read; most of them have said that the story was compelling enough to draw them in and make them stick with the book.
Of course. You're asking why that should be. Well, I take great pains to make my characters as real as possible. If the character has another problem besides what I have presented him/her with in the story, then I also show him/her dealing with that other problem in order to develop the character fully. The only exceptions I have made to making the characters real is the short story, Wild Weasel Wilson and the Banshee Chicken. In it, I used stock, stereotyped characters, though the stereotypes my not have been recognized by many readers. The reason they were unrecognizable is because I knew a great many people in my youth who spoke and acted like Niedyck and his cronies. And the vernacular in which I wrote the story was one that I grew up hearing from family members and friends. It's very nearly another dialect of English, like the old Plug-a-ploo dialect spoken by the mountain-men of the 19th century.
Yes, I exaggerated the dialect. Why? you ask? Well, the story was supposed to be a tongue-in-cheek, taunting leer at myself, my family and many of the friends I once knew. You would have had to grow up when and where I did, with the people I grew up with, to really get the story. Oh, sure, it's funny and at least one of my readers gets it; though she is of a later generation. She has known, and still knows, people who behave and speak as the characters in the story. So, yes, Wild Weasel Wilson and the Banshee Chicken lives on and re-echoes through the years, though the people who inspired the story are long dead or so respectable nowadays that they can't recognize themselves as the inspiration for the characters.
As for my other works; as I said, I make the characters as real as I can and give them problems to deal with that can be insurmountable. That they manage to emerge victorious makes them the heroes that I once read about as a boy in old Norse myths. Incredibly human and flawed, but willing and able to push their way through to the end and come out on top.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Congruencies and others.
As for the content; well, the content isn't always everyone's cup of tea. However, many of my readers have said that though the content wasn't what they were accustomed to and not what they usually looked for in a read; most of them have said that the story was compelling enough to draw them in and make them stick with the book.
Of course. You're asking why that should be. Well, I take great pains to make my characters as real as possible. If the character has another problem besides what I have presented him/her with in the story, then I also show him/her dealing with that other problem in order to develop the character fully. The only exceptions I have made to making the characters real is the short story, Wild Weasel Wilson and the Banshee Chicken. In it, I used stock, stereotyped characters, though the stereotypes my not have been recognized by many readers. The reason they were unrecognizable is because I knew a great many people in my youth who spoke and acted like Niedyck and his cronies. And the vernacular in which I wrote the story was one that I grew up hearing from family members and friends. It's very nearly another dialect of English, like the old Plug-a-ploo dialect spoken by the mountain-men of the 19th century.
Yes, I exaggerated the dialect. Why? you ask? Well, the story was supposed to be a tongue-in-cheek, taunting leer at myself, my family and many of the friends I once knew. You would have had to grow up when and where I did, with the people I grew up with, to really get the story. Oh, sure, it's funny and at least one of my readers gets it; though she is of a later generation. She has known, and still knows, people who behave and speak as the characters in the story. So, yes, Wild Weasel Wilson and the Banshee Chicken lives on and re-echoes through the years, though the people who inspired the story are long dead or so respectable nowadays that they can't recognize themselves as the inspiration for the characters.
As for my other works; as I said, I make the characters as real as I can and give them problems to deal with that can be insurmountable. That they manage to emerge victorious makes them the heroes that I once read about as a boy in old Norse myths. Incredibly human and flawed, but willing and able to push their way through to the end and come out on top.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Congruencies and others.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Finding yourself in an unintentional series
A couple of years ago, I wrote a book about a cloned, historical figure and needed a set of supporting characters that I thought I could throw away. Little did I know that those throwaways intrigued me so much that I felt compelled to use them in still another book. And another, until I discovered that I had begun writing a series.
I discovered myself in a fictional city that I came to know like the back of my hand and the characters had taken on lives of their own. They came to life in Eggs of Empire, and continued, in a peripheral way, in Questionable Interests, until they came to be full-blown in Dolly Games. I am currently using them again in a sequel to Dolly Games, titled Laying Ghosts.
I have written the books out of order and am working at tying them together with this sequel. For those who wonder what the actual order of the series should be; here it is, in chronological order: Dolly Games, Laying Ghosts, Eggs of Empire, Questionable Interests and still another novel to be named later.
I know that reading them out of order messes up the flow of the story-arc that will not become apparent until the reader encounters the last, un-named novel, but that is the way I have usually read most of the series I have read. Of course, I am an inveterate re-reader of the books in my possession, so I almost always give myself a chance to forget what happens in the series and then go back and read it from the beginning.
I hope this helps my fans and occasional readers.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Gulf of the Plains, both I and II, Congruencies, Taken Apart and others.
I discovered myself in a fictional city that I came to know like the back of my hand and the characters had taken on lives of their own. They came to life in Eggs of Empire, and continued, in a peripheral way, in Questionable Interests, until they came to be full-blown in Dolly Games. I am currently using them again in a sequel to Dolly Games, titled Laying Ghosts.
I have written the books out of order and am working at tying them together with this sequel. For those who wonder what the actual order of the series should be; here it is, in chronological order: Dolly Games, Laying Ghosts, Eggs of Empire, Questionable Interests and still another novel to be named later.
I know that reading them out of order messes up the flow of the story-arc that will not become apparent until the reader encounters the last, un-named novel, but that is the way I have usually read most of the series I have read. Of course, I am an inveterate re-reader of the books in my possession, so I almost always give myself a chance to forget what happens in the series and then go back and read it from the beginning.
I hope this helps my fans and occasional readers.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Gulf of the Plains, both I and II, Congruencies, Taken Apart and others.
Friday, December 16, 2011
Backstory
What is it and how does it work? Well, backstory is what has happened to or with a character when he/she isn't front and center in the action. It's something that isn't described in the story but contributes to the character's development.
Some authors, one of my favorites among them, will sit down and write an entire biography of a character and pick and choose things in the bio to throw into a story to color the character. In my novel, Questionable Interests, Drummond 'Butcher' Rand, has been out of town attending the wedding of his half-brother's daughter. He mentions it in passing and reflects on the hard feelings between him and his half-brother without really detailing the source of the hard feelings. It also shows that despite the difficulties of his relationship with his half-brother, he is thoughtful enough to attend the girl's wedding and give the happy couple a generous wedding gift. It gives him a history without the tiresome info-dumps that can drag down the flow of a story. It's economical and gets the information across.
Sometimes, the author may have had people wondering about a character's backstory and be pressed into using more of it in a later novel to feed the readers' curiosity regarding the character. Of such are pre-quels born.
For more instances of how backstory can be used, simply read a few of Hemingway's stories. He was a master of the lightly alluded to backstory. His use of the tool managed to give the reader a sense of understanding more than he knew from the story. Perhaps that description is a little tricky but it gets the point across.
Did you ever pick up a book and begin reading it, only to find passages in it that made you think that you had gotten into the middle of a series? That's backstory. The character has a history, the reader is aware that there is a history and it tends to make the reader more interested in learning about the character.
Now, I said when I began this blog that I am not qualified, and will not attempt, to give any how-to lectures on writing. However, I did say that I wanted to give the reader some idea of how I worked. This is it. Take from it what you will.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains and Congruencies
Some authors, one of my favorites among them, will sit down and write an entire biography of a character and pick and choose things in the bio to throw into a story to color the character. In my novel, Questionable Interests, Drummond 'Butcher' Rand, has been out of town attending the wedding of his half-brother's daughter. He mentions it in passing and reflects on the hard feelings between him and his half-brother without really detailing the source of the hard feelings. It also shows that despite the difficulties of his relationship with his half-brother, he is thoughtful enough to attend the girl's wedding and give the happy couple a generous wedding gift. It gives him a history without the tiresome info-dumps that can drag down the flow of a story. It's economical and gets the information across.
Sometimes, the author may have had people wondering about a character's backstory and be pressed into using more of it in a later novel to feed the readers' curiosity regarding the character. Of such are pre-quels born.
For more instances of how backstory can be used, simply read a few of Hemingway's stories. He was a master of the lightly alluded to backstory. His use of the tool managed to give the reader a sense of understanding more than he knew from the story. Perhaps that description is a little tricky but it gets the point across.
Did you ever pick up a book and begin reading it, only to find passages in it that made you think that you had gotten into the middle of a series? That's backstory. The character has a history, the reader is aware that there is a history and it tends to make the reader more interested in learning about the character.
Now, I said when I began this blog that I am not qualified, and will not attempt, to give any how-to lectures on writing. However, I did say that I wanted to give the reader some idea of how I worked. This is it. Take from it what you will.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains and Congruencies
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
The imagined city
And you say, "What in the world is Derek talking about now?" Well, I'll tell you. A couple of years ago, I was writing a story and needed a city to hold a great deal of the action. I felt that I wanted it to be in the Pacific Northwest, but I knew nothing about any of the cities there. Oh, I know which ones they are, but I knew very little about them. I knew I could research them, but there was this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that if I got something wrong about whatever city I included in the story, there would be a million or so people lambasting me about their hometown. Any errors would throw doubt on the story and on my abilities to write. I couldn't have that, so I devised this fictitious city of Port Morgan.
To tell the truth, I've actually lost count of exactly how many stories I've used the city in, but I'm going to put them in chronological order for you. Because, you see, I also used or mentioned several characters in multiple stories. Or, I allowed characters from one book to walk down the streets of Port Morgan as 'extras' in the movie that played in my head and ended up on the page. But, you know what? I couldn't come up with an appropriate name for the city until my latest novel.
Okay, here they are, in chronological order according to what is happening in the stories: Dolly Games, Eggs of Empire, Cold Feet(A short story), Questionable Interests and Taken Apart.
I know this isn't exactly fair. In order to understand what I'm talking about, a person would have to have read all of these stories. Incidentally, Cold Feet is included in my book of shorts titled, The Empty Heart: A Collection. But you have to pay attention because some of the characters who have made uncredited cameo appearances in these books are not identified and only exist in the stories for a paragraph or two. Sometimes, they are only described in passing. but if you know the stories, then you know the characters.
No. I won't tell you which ones they are and I won't give hints.
Returning to the fact that I didn't give the city a name until recently; I don't know if a name never really popped out and made itself known to me, or if I was just being lazy and using a location that I had already invested a lot of time and effort on. Who knows? I don't.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains I and II, and Congruencies.
To tell the truth, I've actually lost count of exactly how many stories I've used the city in, but I'm going to put them in chronological order for you. Because, you see, I also used or mentioned several characters in multiple stories. Or, I allowed characters from one book to walk down the streets of Port Morgan as 'extras' in the movie that played in my head and ended up on the page. But, you know what? I couldn't come up with an appropriate name for the city until my latest novel.
Okay, here they are, in chronological order according to what is happening in the stories: Dolly Games, Eggs of Empire, Cold Feet(A short story), Questionable Interests and Taken Apart.
I know this isn't exactly fair. In order to understand what I'm talking about, a person would have to have read all of these stories. Incidentally, Cold Feet is included in my book of shorts titled, The Empty Heart: A Collection. But you have to pay attention because some of the characters who have made uncredited cameo appearances in these books are not identified and only exist in the stories for a paragraph or two. Sometimes, they are only described in passing. but if you know the stories, then you know the characters.
No. I won't tell you which ones they are and I won't give hints.
Returning to the fact that I didn't give the city a name until recently; I don't know if a name never really popped out and made itself known to me, or if I was just being lazy and using a location that I had already invested a lot of time and effort on. Who knows? I don't.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains I and II, and Congruencies.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Latest novel's reception
I last left you with the news that Dolly Games was going to be available in the KLL(KDP Select Lending Library), and was going to be offered free for just two days. So far, the number of downloads of this book far outstrip all my other offerings by such a margin that it is difficult to quantify it. At least, for me it is. I wondered for the past day and night if it was being downloaded so much simply because it was free. Well, now I know that it is also a very good book. One of my toughest critics is my youngest daughter, (Hi, Kris!) while my oldest daughter has been overwhelmingly in favor of everything I've written, (Hi, Mel!).
Kris is one of those very busy people who has difficulty finding time to do the things she wants because she has so much that she has committed herself to do for her family and others. As such, sometimes, dear-ol'-Dad falls by the wayside and that has been the case with many of the books I've written. Of course, I know that the genres I generally write in aren't for everybody and not usually to her taste. However, she called me today to tell me that she loved my latest book and that it was "scary". She also told me that she had called a friend of hers who writes a blog dealing with free Kindle books and started to tell her about my book. Her friend stopped her and told her that she had already downloaded the book and loved it!
Since so many people refuse to buy a book that has no reviews posted about it on its Amazon page, I ask all those who have read Dolly Games to post a review. You wouldn't believe how many people won't buy a book for the most inane reasons; some people won't buy a book if the cover doesn't appear to be professionally done. Or, if it has a generic, two-color cover. Or,if they think the book's description page indicates that it might have skeezy content. It is the same with reviews. Some people won't buy a book that has no reviews. Others won't buy a book that has even one bad review. Still others won't buy a book that has reviews written by people who can't spell grammar, much less use proper grammar when writing anything. I guess they think the book must be low-brow or that the people who wrote the reviews are so clueless about what is good that their opinion can't be trusted. So, please, if you have downloaded Dolly Games, post a review. It doesn't matter to me if it is a good or bad review; a good one can only help others to make up their minds about the book and I can learn from a bad review.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Congruencies, The Empty Heart: A Collection and others.
Kris is one of those very busy people who has difficulty finding time to do the things she wants because she has so much that she has committed herself to do for her family and others. As such, sometimes, dear-ol'-Dad falls by the wayside and that has been the case with many of the books I've written. Of course, I know that the genres I generally write in aren't for everybody and not usually to her taste. However, she called me today to tell me that she loved my latest book and that it was "scary". She also told me that she had called a friend of hers who writes a blog dealing with free Kindle books and started to tell her about my book. Her friend stopped her and told her that she had already downloaded the book and loved it!
Since so many people refuse to buy a book that has no reviews posted about it on its Amazon page, I ask all those who have read Dolly Games to post a review. You wouldn't believe how many people won't buy a book for the most inane reasons; some people won't buy a book if the cover doesn't appear to be professionally done. Or, if it has a generic, two-color cover. Or,if they think the book's description page indicates that it might have skeezy content. It is the same with reviews. Some people won't buy a book that has no reviews. Others won't buy a book that has even one bad review. Still others won't buy a book that has reviews written by people who can't spell grammar, much less use proper grammar when writing anything. I guess they think the book must be low-brow or that the people who wrote the reviews are so clueless about what is good that their opinion can't be trusted. So, please, if you have downloaded Dolly Games, post a review. It doesn't matter to me if it is a good or bad review; a good one can only help others to make up their minds about the book and I can learn from a bad review.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Congruencies, The Empty Heart: A Collection and others.
Friday, December 9, 2011
Self-censoring as a writer
Yeah, that's right, I'm taking that subject out of the box. Let's grab hold of it, roll it around, give it a shake and see what happens.
From cruising the Kindle Boards, I've seen some folks lament the lack of clean stories. I agree that there is a time and place for the sort of thing that sometimes ends up in my novels, and those who object to sometimes vulgar language, tittilating, even almost explicit subject matter, should understand that every bit of it in my stories is meant to advance the story. Either that or to add to character development. Sometimes I use it to set the tone for the story or to clarify a character's motivations.
Bad language can and should be used to show the state of mind of a character under stress. If that character is the type of person who wouldn't be expected to use bad language. And it can be used to show exactly how stressful a situation is. If the character has taken everything thrown at him/her in stride and is suddenly found to be cursing, that just means the character is under a great deal of stress. More than he/she has experienced previously. And sometimes, a character is just such an uninhibited person, accustomed to the lowlife, that the use of bad language is natural for him/her.
Now, to sex. How many of us have had sex waved under our noses as a carrot to get us to do something that someone else wants us to do. I mean, sex can be a great tool for manipulation of others. It can and has been used to ruin many lives in the past and will continue to be used because it is such an effective tool. Sex is one of the great motivators of History. Though it is viewed as something cheap, it is very nearly as great a motivator as Money and Power. If we could peek into the boudoirs of the most powerful, richest people in History, I think we would find that freedom of sexual practices is one of their favorite pastimes. How many rich and powerful people have had careers ruined because the most intimate, private and personal details of their lives have been brought to light?
By using sex to show how a character reacts, whether he/she is the most powerful person in the story, or the least, I can establish the fact that he/she is simply another person. No different in substance than anyone else.
So, should a writer self-censor himself/herself? I can only say that it depends on the circumstances of the story, the audience he/she wants to reach and how the writer wants his/her work to be perceived. Think of all the books that would have been tremendously different if the author had left sex out of the equation. Lolita, Catcher in the Rye, Portnoy's Complaint, Ulysses. Those are only a few that I can name, but you get the idea. Writers are creative people or they wouldn't be writers. I'm not sure I would go so far as to describe them as artists; I know that I am not an artist, I'm a writer.
As a writer, I have an inborn need to communicate, to be understood, to connect with my readers. I thought once of blunting my creative urge and becoming a critic, but felt that the choice wouldn't allow me to be true to myself. I have to admit that I was feeling somewhat tremulous about my writing ability and was timid about putting my writing efforts out there for others to see. I mean, the full extent of a critic's creativity is only in how to describe how much they like or dislike another's work. From some of the reviews I've read of others' work, critics don't seem to feel the need to self-censor. Believe me, I self-censor quite a lot of my work. I have written some passages that have stunned me when I've gone back to proofread them. A couple of times, I've said to myself, "What in the world would Miss Grundy say?"
In closing, I can only say that whether or not a writer self-censors is entirely up to him/her.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains and Congruencies.
From cruising the Kindle Boards, I've seen some folks lament the lack of clean stories. I agree that there is a time and place for the sort of thing that sometimes ends up in my novels, and those who object to sometimes vulgar language, tittilating, even almost explicit subject matter, should understand that every bit of it in my stories is meant to advance the story. Either that or to add to character development. Sometimes I use it to set the tone for the story or to clarify a character's motivations.
Bad language can and should be used to show the state of mind of a character under stress. If that character is the type of person who wouldn't be expected to use bad language. And it can be used to show exactly how stressful a situation is. If the character has taken everything thrown at him/her in stride and is suddenly found to be cursing, that just means the character is under a great deal of stress. More than he/she has experienced previously. And sometimes, a character is just such an uninhibited person, accustomed to the lowlife, that the use of bad language is natural for him/her.
Now, to sex. How many of us have had sex waved under our noses as a carrot to get us to do something that someone else wants us to do. I mean, sex can be a great tool for manipulation of others. It can and has been used to ruin many lives in the past and will continue to be used because it is such an effective tool. Sex is one of the great motivators of History. Though it is viewed as something cheap, it is very nearly as great a motivator as Money and Power. If we could peek into the boudoirs of the most powerful, richest people in History, I think we would find that freedom of sexual practices is one of their favorite pastimes. How many rich and powerful people have had careers ruined because the most intimate, private and personal details of their lives have been brought to light?
By using sex to show how a character reacts, whether he/she is the most powerful person in the story, or the least, I can establish the fact that he/she is simply another person. No different in substance than anyone else.
So, should a writer self-censor himself/herself? I can only say that it depends on the circumstances of the story, the audience he/she wants to reach and how the writer wants his/her work to be perceived. Think of all the books that would have been tremendously different if the author had left sex out of the equation. Lolita, Catcher in the Rye, Portnoy's Complaint, Ulysses. Those are only a few that I can name, but you get the idea. Writers are creative people or they wouldn't be writers. I'm not sure I would go so far as to describe them as artists; I know that I am not an artist, I'm a writer.
As a writer, I have an inborn need to communicate, to be understood, to connect with my readers. I thought once of blunting my creative urge and becoming a critic, but felt that the choice wouldn't allow me to be true to myself. I have to admit that I was feeling somewhat tremulous about my writing ability and was timid about putting my writing efforts out there for others to see. I mean, the full extent of a critic's creativity is only in how to describe how much they like or dislike another's work. From some of the reviews I've read of others' work, critics don't seem to feel the need to self-censor. Believe me, I self-censor quite a lot of my work. I have written some passages that have stunned me when I've gone back to proofread them. A couple of times, I've said to myself, "What in the world would Miss Grundy say?"
In closing, I can only say that whether or not a writer self-censors is entirely up to him/her.
Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains and Congruencies.
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