Category: QuickJAB

QuickJAB

National Doughnut Day Month

JAB

Sweet Deal Sealed LettersizeLargerMedX9

If you’ve been waiting all year for National Doughnut Day, you’re in luck. It’s National Doughnut Day Month! Yep, in honor of the Doughnut Lady and Woody, we aren’t doughnut-deprived because June 1 was National Doughnut Day.

This will be a short post because I want to beat the crowds at the local Doughnut Shop. I know Dunkin Doughnuts, Krispy Kreme, and all the other smaller doughnut shops will heartily support National Doughnut Day Month. Don’t believe me? Walk into a shop and take a big whiff…doughnuts, right? See! All month!

And while you’re waiting in line for that doughnut, how about using your phone, which I see in your hand, to leave a review for Sweet Deal Sealed on Amazon. I know you’ve read it. Doesn’t have to be long or flowery. How about “I’m standing in line waiting for a doughnut because I read Sweet Deal Sealed and now I need a doughnut.”  See? Easy.

Oh. You haven’t read Sweet Deal Sealed? See the phone in your hand? Sweet Deal Sealed is on Amazon. You can read the ebook on your phone, tablet or computer.  Or if the feel and convenience of a paperback is your preference, same link and your postal carrier will deliver!  Link to Sweet Deal Sealed on Amazon

 

QuickJAB

Acknowledgments

JAB
thank you text on black and brown board
Photo by rawpixel.com on Pexels.com

The novel’s done. The final draft has been copyedited, proofed, and formatted for publishing. Now for the Front Matter and the Back Matter. Somewhere in the Front Matter or the Back Matter, it depends on which template you use or source you listen to or read last, is the Acknowledgments.

I’ve read that writing the Acknowledgments is a drudge. Harder than writing the book. It took me a year to write the book. Don’t need a year to write Thank You, right?

I did a little internet search on how to write an Acknowledgement for a novel. I learned I spelled it wrong. The next thing I learned is that I shouldn’t bore the reader or be superficial. Of course, I immediately decided anyone who can’t even spell Acknowledgment correctly must be superficial, so I’m doomed.

The Ack – we’ll call it – is supposed to be specific, walk the reader through the entire process of writing the book, but not be too long, must be witty, and again with the not boring. Also, mention names, but respect people’s privacy…ACK!

So here ya go….

ACK!! THANKS Y’ALL, FOR EVERYTHING!

There. That should just about cover it. Didn’t even split an infinitive or invoke a gerund. Nailed it!

 

 

QuickJAB

So Many Chuckles in Just a Few Words

JAB

You fill in the jokes. I’ll supply the words. Ready? GO!

I will be at the GARS Hamfest in Waldo tomorrow from 8:00 AM – 2:00 PM. I’ll be signing and selling Pink Baby Alligator and talking about Sweet Deals : Sealed and maybe The Girl Who Saw Clouds. #FlatRose will be there too.

And the best joke of all? It’s true – no joke!

Gainesville Amateur Radio Society Hamfest

14370 Kennard St. (First Baptist Church)

Waldo, Florida 32694

If you like electronics, gadgets, and books… might be worth the drive.

If your interest is piqued, then punch in the address and show up! Free parking and $7.00 per person entry fee.

QuickJAB

How Writing Is Like Making Jam

JAB

When I make jam, I pull out the Ball Blue Book of canning and check the recipe even though I’ve made jam dozens of time over the last several years. I crush the berries, dump in the sugar, turn up the gas, and stir. And stir and stir. I don’t use pectin to thicken the concoction, and I don’t have a jelly thermometer. I stir and after 30 or 45 minutes, it feels done. If I quit too early, I have berry soup. If I stir another two minutes, I have berry concrete. It’s all in the timing, and it all comes together—boom!

So this is my Writing blog, not my Farm blog, right?

I wrote a story on January 6, 2017. The story was 727 words. I added a few more words, and the name of my story became Novel Needs a Name. N3 became The Girl Who Saw Clouds last summer.  I have a total of 106 versions of Clouds. Different people have read different versions over the past year. One faithful reader has seen every single one! We’ll refer to her as Saint Rabbit. Writers have critiqued different sections, and I wrote and revised.

I read Don McNair’s Editor-Proof Your Writing and followed his twenty-one steps. Clouds was ready for a copy editor. Not too soon, not too late. Now I have to leave Clouds alone and let the copy editor do his work; otherwise, I’d have Cloud concrete, right?

Yesterday I read Guido Henkel’s Zen of eBook Formatting and made blackberry jam. Today I designed the book cover.  Only twenty more days before the copy editor’s work is due. Maybe I’ll make some more blackberry jam. Boom.

 

 

QuickJAB

Confessions of a Story-Teller

JAB

I was born a story-teller. The story words bubbled up inside me and strained to escape. They detoured my brain and flew straight to my mouth or my typing fingers. For years while my words and I struggled to survive in the corporate world, we were feared and labeled frivolous and irrelevant. Wordy, even. My brain suggested I was not a story-teller, and I turned to conforming by slaughtering words. Dark times. I popped the action, sights, sounds, tastes, feels, and detail bubbles. Even when words bolted through the typing exit, very few survived.

My story words and I abandoned the corporate world for the world of fiction. My empowered stories shoot from my typing fingers, leaving room inside for new words to incubate and grow in my brain. First Draft. Second Draft. The only slaughter is Killing the Darlings, but that’s another story.