Thursday started with me giving that story another go I’d abandoned halfway through. Yes, we’re supposed to read these stories for entertainment and if we’re not enjoying it we’re supposed to stop reading (according to 2 tutors at least). But I’m reading these particular stories for research and if I don’t like the story, I’d like to know why so I can avoid it in my stories.
This one was still magic, and I’m not a great deal into magic. But I pushed that to one side so I could study the story and the story structure. I’m glad I made it to the end and I never have to read it ever again. It wasn’t offensive. I just didn’t like it and if it had been a longer story, then I would have stopped reading it.
Once at my desk I caught up with this week’s Zoom call for the Christmas cosy workshop. I’ll watch them all again as revision when I’m ready to carry on with CHRISTMAS AT WHITEHORSE FARM. (I’ve had to stop using italics as they’re suddenly not translating over to WordPress, and I really can’t be arsed to find out why at the moment.) Most of the rest of the class are already on Act/Part 3 now, but I’m still at the beginning.
I bought the final few instalments of a cosy mystery series I really like, transferred them from Kindle to the computer and moved them to Kobo, Google Play Books and Apple Books. The original publisher of this series has ceased trading now, and the author has re-released all of his books with new covers, but they’re nowhere near as good nor as nice as the ones the publisher paid for. So I grabbed images of the original covers and put them on the new books. I can’t get the Kindle to change the covers, but it’s black and white anyway and I rarely read it now.
This author seems to be exclusive to Kindle, so I wasn’t able to buy his books anywhere else, and there are 26 of them. I won’t be trying any of his new books now I have this complete series. Not unless he goes wide.
I bought the 10th Julia Chapman Dales Detective Agency series on Kindle and converted that. I wish I remembered to check Google Play Books first, as they had it too for the same price. I bought Maria DiRico’s 2nd book in her series from Google Play Books, which was £2 cheaper than on Kindle.
And I bought my first Helen Golden book to try. It seems hers are exclusive to Kindle too, so I had to buy that one there as well.
In future I really, really must check Google Play Books first. And if they don’t have it, then I’ll think carefully about buying a new author. I understand them wanting to make the most of the KU readers when the books first come out, but I don’t know why they leave them in there for ever and a day after the initial 3-month period is up. And I know more and more people who don’t want to be buying their books from Amazon.
I started today’s blog post and updated the magic bakery link below. And I shared Diane’s Gig List. I’m having some problems logging in to the Monkey Dust page on FB and then, when I eventually get in, more problems actually changing anything on there. It’s freezing the desktop, no matter which browser I’m using, and then freezing FB. I’ve tried on one browser on the phone and it gets stuck as well, but then a different browser on the phone seems to get past it. I’ve reported it to FB but I hope it isn’t our internet address that’s causing issues.
I’ll be glad when I’m doing much less on Facebook.
I’ve been having problems with WordPress too on Firefox browser. It keeps logging me out and when I log back in after leaving a comment, it sends my own reply to me. Safari just keeps getting stuck on everything, so I’m using that less and less. There aren’t any updates available either, for Safari or for Mac, so who knows what’s going on there? I reported it to Facebook because the Apple help pages say it’s Meta’s DNS that’s at fault.
For the rest of the day I worked on END OF THE RAINBOW. I’m only 4,000 words away from the 15,000 minimum word count for this, so I’m happy.
Have a great weekend. We will!
The magic bakery
A few years ago I stumbled across a book called THE MAGIC BAKERY by Dean Wesley Smith. Originally written in 2017, this book turned on a lightbulb inside my head and enabled me to see copyright in a whole different glow.
One of the first things I did, after reading this book, was start my own magic bakery. And in one 12-month period, I published around 56 books: short stories; collections; novellas; novels; and non-fiction books. Fifty-six of ‘em. I’ve added to them since, but those books now provide me with a steady trickle of income. Passive income.
Well, the magic bakery is back, but this time Smith is updating it, chapter by chapter, first on his website, then in a class, and then in a new and updated book. Here’s chapter seven.
I’ll carry on linking to the chapters, as they appear, so that you guys have some understanding of what I’m banging on about when I persist in talking about my magic bakery. And I’ll repeat this bit of blurb every time for first-time readers.
For those of you who’d rather read them as Smith posts them himself, rather than when I get around to it, you can go straight to his website here.
Is that 2nd Maria DiRico book LONG ISLAND ICED TINA? That is one of my favorites. I was literally laughing out loud during it. I know most of the locations on which it’s based, which made it even funnier.
I always had issues with WP on Firefox. I’m slowly training myself ot use Duck Duck Go for things, and it works really well, both for searches (one gets actual information) and in general working with my sites. I have to do all my updates for Pages on States and the Nina Bell site on Duck Duck Go, because there are issues on other browsers.
Happy Solstice, and have a great weekend!
I keep forgetting to ‘fireproof’ DuckDuckGo, but even when I do, it still seems to forget who I am. I doubt I’ll be keeping Firefox for much longer. I only installed it because I was having problems with Safari. I do like a backup browser, though.
Yes, it’s Long Island Iced Tina. I’ve been meaning to get it ever since I finished the first one, which you recommended!
And the same to you!