Category: QuickJAB

QuickJAB

2020 – View from the Author’s Seat

JAB

My goal for 2020 was to write and publish four books.

One of the four books I planned was a complete rewrite of a novella because it was Book 1 of a series. Little did I know in my younger years – back in the day – of 2018 that a novella is not Book 1 of a series of novels; instead, it is Book 0.5. Learning is fun. And hard. New Book 1 became a novel and is officially Second Edition of Book 1.

The other three books were planned to be one book for each of my three series. My editor was busy, as all editors are, but she was onboard for four.

Then 2020 happened, and just like the rest of the world, both my editor and I were less busy than we had planned. I wrote, she edited, and I published six books in 2020.

QuickJAB

Author Goals – 2021

JAB

RECAP

2018 Goals: Publish a book Results: Published two books

2019 Goals: Publish four books and earn a prestigious award Results: Published four books and received three prestigious awards.

2020 Goals: Publish four books, receive a prestigious award, sell one book through a bookstore; and stretch goal, end the year with a POSITIVE net income

Results: Published six books, received a prestigious award, sold books in US and UK bookstores, and ended the year with a POSITIVE net income of four figures

Note to any far-flung relatives who show up looking for a handout now that I’m only four figures in negative net earnings: I will feed you, introduce you to the dogs and chickens, provide you a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and boring conversation about books, chickens, trees, and dogs then sell you a book or two before you leave.

GOALS for 2021

2021 Goals: Publish six books including Book 1 of a New Series, sell a complete series through a bookstore; and a wild dream of a stretch goal, end the year with a positive net income of five figures.

Bonus Goal for 2021 – Tame the Wild Unicorn

 

QuickJAB

And the Award Winner is . . .

JAB

Danger in the Clouds!

 

The Independent Author Network announced the Winners for the International 2020 Book of the Year Awards!

DANGER IN THE CLOUDS was selected as a finalist in the category of Science Fiction where the TOP NINE Science Fiction novels for 2020 were recognized out of thousands of nominations.

What? You haven’t read Danger in the Clouds?

Don’t miss out! TAP or CLICK the button for DANGER IN THE CLOUDS

GRID DOWN SURVIVAL SERIES

DANGER IN THE CLOUDS, BOOK 1

DANGER IN THE WIND, BOOK 2

WATCH FOR THE NEW RELEASE! BOOK 3

QuickJAB

Halloween Preparations 2020

JAB

After we moved from the suburbs to the country many years ago, I lost interest in Halloween. Trick or treaters don’t trudge from house to house when the houses are a mile or more apart. There’s not a good return on investment there – just ask any six-year-old trick or treater who calculates success by the number of pieces of candy per hour.

The year 2020 has broken the “same ole, same ole” rule. But not all is bad because this year, Halloween falls on Saturday! For the first time in 2020, I’m attending a fair to talk to actual people in real life and sell a few books! 

Of course, all good book and artisan fairs begin with planning. 

 

Actual picture of my vendor friends and me planning for the Elevate Artisan Market.

Elevate Artisan Market Tap or Click

The 125!! artisans are all local folks, and every item on display for sale at the outdoor Elevate Artisan Market was hand-crafted by the artisan. Did I tell you the Elevate Artisan Market is hosted on an Alpaca Farm? Did you know that the motto of the farm is Spit Happens?

Because it’s Halloween, Elevate Artisan Market is hosting a Trick or Treat bonanza to satisfy even the most discerning six-year-old candy-counter. 125 artisans, most of whom had not seen a trick or treater in years, are preparing for the Trick or Treat festival that will never be forgotten. Calculate THAT, you number-crunching, candy-munching six-year-olds!

Because children are invited to wear costumes, wouldn’t you guess the crazy creatives who are staffing those booths might be in costume too? I won’t tell you exactly what my costume is, but here’s a peek at my vendor apron.

Do these spiders make me look fat?

Click or tap the apron to fly to my website. 

I might need to find a broom appropriate for someone who is wearing a spider apron.

If you can get to Cairo, Georgia by October 31, bring your mask and your favorite trick or treaters. It will be a fun, sweet, exhausting, beautiful day.

And in case you wondered, Cairo is pronounced KAY-Row in south Georgia. Like the syrup. Which may be pronounced sir-RUP or SEE-rup or …

See you at the sweetest Halloween Artisan Fair in the entire United States. (Go ahead. Name even one other)

 

 

 

QuickJAB

Apples or Pumpkins

JAB

So many annual events have been postponed until 2021, so I wondered how many of the 2020 outdoor fall festivals would proceed as planned. My research led me to conclude there are two major fall festivals – apple and pumpkin.

As an aside, did you expect Halloween festivals in addition to apple or in place of pumpkin? Not this year. My theory is that not everyone can fit into last year’s costume.

Back to our fall festivals. From there, I jumped into the next rabbit hole – given a choice, which would people prefer? Or more specifically, apples or pumpkins – which do readers prefer?

So, I asked my newsletter readers their preference – apples or pumpkins. The result? Apples won and by such a large percentage, that I gave APPLE the opportunity for a cameo appearance in my newly released novel. Much to my surprise, Apple made two appearances. Let’s see if the readers find both of them.

If you are interested in becoming a subscriber to my newsletter, you are welcome to join us in our shenanigans.

Here’s the link! Click or tap!  Subscribe to the Newsletter!

QuickJAB

Old Hens Know All the Tricks

JAB

   

We started our chicken journey with eight chickens in February 2014. The one-day-old chick is a Buff Orpington. This one could be Eva, Joanna, Ruthie, or Leah. The other four chicks were Black Australorps: Lydia, Ninja, Sarah, and Rachel.

Lydia checks the fenceline for grasshoppers. She is the only one of the original eight that we still have, and she is still laying beautiful, light tan eggs with a purple sheen at least every other day. We have forty other chickens. They may be bigger, faster, and more aggressive, but nobody gives Lydia grief. Old hens know all the tricks.

 

Sadie is a German short-haired pointer and was born in December 2005. She was a rescue dog and came our way five years later. Her back legs aren’t as strong as they used to be, and her hearing is almost nonexistent. The aggressive tumor in her right eye was removed last year along with her eye, and her left eye doesn’t see so good. But she’s a happy old girl and still runs the paths and deer trails and keeps track of everyone. She loves the dog door because she can stick out her nose and check the weather and the smells.

Sadie loves camping and being outside, but when it’s hot, she loves being in the air conditioning. Old dogs know all the tricks.

 

Farmer Woman was born way before you all. Her eyesight is lousy, and she can’t see stars at night. She cleans the chicken coop every day and loves to learn new things. She writes novels, established a publishing business, and is a marketer. She drags heavy limbs to the burn pile and is a weather expert.

She loves camping and being outside, but when it’s hot and buggy, she loves being in the air conditioning. Old Farmer Women know all the tricks.

 

QuickJAB

How to Whitelist Your Email

JAB

What is “Whitelist”?

Whitelist means to add an email address for someone – in our case, Judith A. Barrett, with the address judith (at) judithabarrett dot com to your email contacts or address book. (Notice the clever attempt to avoid the screenscrapers who grab email addresses off websites and scam like crazy?)

Why Whitelist?

Email providers are sometimes overzealous in their filtering. Whitelisting makes sure that you see the my emails in your inbox or primary folder and don’t miss out!

In general, if you do not see an email from Judith A. Barrett in your Inbox, the email may have mistakenly been sent to your spam or junk folder. Open the folder and move the email out.  See the following instructions on how to whitelist Judith A. Barrett Judith (at) judithabarrett dot com for common email providers. (I’ll list it in the rest of the document as myname@mydomain.com for ease of typing and reading!)

How to Whitelist

GMail

  1. Check Spam or an email from Judith A. Barrett and open the email.
  2. Click ‘Dots’ button on the top right and select Filter messages like this .
  3. Check Categorize: Choose Category and click the downdrop icon next to Choose Category.
  4. Select Primary in the next options menu.
  5. If the message remains  in spam, mark it as “Not Spam” to report it as not spam.
  6. If you don’t find it in spam, check Promotions and move the email to Primary.
  7. A black bar message will appear in the corner of your screen. “Conversation moved to Primary. Do this for future messages from myname@mydomain.com?” Select Yes.

Continue reading “How to Whitelist Your Email” →

QuickJAB

Reader Magnet Short Story, Chapter 1

JAB

What Is a Reader Magnet?

A year ago, I had no idea what a reader magnet was. In my literalness, I envisioned a nice refrigerator magnet with a picture of a book and a puppy. And maybe a kitten and a chicken for good measure. I don’t know about anybody else’s readers except mine – but we all like books, puppies, kittens, and chickens.

Then I stumbled across the idea of a “short story” that would give a reader a taste of the author’s brilliant writing. My first thought: That’s dreadful.

The Short Story that Wasn’t a Reader Magnet

Case in point: I wrote a short story called Barter and Bargains three years ago and submitted it to millions of contests. (I typed jillions, but autocorrect frowns on exaggeration.) The maximum word count allowed was 5,000, so I had to trim my 7,500-word story back with a hatchet.

I received two recurring criticisms:

  1. The story was too nice.
  2. The critic/judge wanted to know more about the characters.

I learned four things from the experience:

  1. I write nice characters that people want to know more about.
  2. I am a great storyteller.
  3. My writing craft skills needed work.
  4. I can’t write short.
  5. Wait, make it five: I’m not deflated by criticism.

Continue reading “Reader Magnet Short Story, Chapter 1” →

QuickJAB

SECOND EDITION? Why?

JAB

SWEET DEAL SEALED, SECOND EDITION

DONUT LADY MYSTERY SERIES, BOOK 1

SDS 3D Paperback May 3 2020

Why a Second Edition?

Short answer:

More Story! The first edition of SWEET DEAL SEALED: A NOVELLA is 115 pages; the new SWEET DEAL SEALED, EXPANDED SECOND EDITION, is 235 pages!

Long Answer:

The first edition of SWEET DEAL SEALED is a novella – a short novel or a long short story. In the publishing world, there is a rule that says a series cannot have a novella as Book 1 unless all the rest of the books are also novellas. Who knew? Not me.

For example, Book listing services list SWEET DEAL SEALED: A NOVELLA, BOOK 1  in the DONUT LADY MYSTERY SERIES as Book 0.5; SWEET DEAL CONCEALED, BOOK 2, is labeled as BOOK 1; SWEET DEAL REVEALED, BOOK 3, labeled as BOOK 2. Ugh. Were readers confused? I know I was!

With DONUT LADY MYSTERY SERIES, BOOK 4 in the plans for 2020, it was time to channel my inner Don Quixote and pick my windmill/battles. Taking on the entire literary and publishing world to force them out of their antiquated rules didn’t seem fun. And I’m in it for the fun. I realized there was so much more to the Donut Lady’s earlier story. Who knew? And the EXPANDED SECOND EDITION was born. Now that was fun!

QUESTION: I’ve already read/never read Sweet Deal Sealed: Novella. Do I read Sweet Deal Sealed, Expanded Second Edition?

ANSWER: YES!

If you’ve read the original novella, you’ll enjoy the expanded story.

If you haven’t read the original novella, all of its story is included in the expanded second edition.

 

Are you interested in Book 4? Watch for it in the fall!
QuickJAB

Author Goals 2020

JAB

My Author Goal in 2018 was to publish a book. Results: I published two books.

My Author Goals in 2019 were to publish four books and earn a prestigious award.  Results: I published four books and received three awards.

My Author Goals for 2020: Publish four books, receive a prestigious award, sell one book through a bookstore, and end the year with a POSITIVE net income. 

That last one – positive net income – is a stretch goal. At least I know the IRS is cheering me on!