I am feeling very blessed at the moment. This evening, there are 794,236 Kindle ebook titles listed on Amazon, and on Grace Awakening‘s second day of sales, it is rated #39,234. I’m trying to figure out the math. Am I right? Is that Top 5%? Can it be possible?
I am beyond thankful for the people who are supporting this great adventure and buying a copy!
Thank you!
Thank you!
Thank you!
Thank you!
Thank you!
Thank you!
It’s an odd feeling when a dream comes true. After the initial euphoria of seeing what you may have wished for and worked for accomplished, there is a only a brief sense of completion and satisfaction.
While it’s fantastic that the dream has been achieved, one can’t just bask forever in achieving one dream, can one? And so, while it was heart stopping to suddenly see Awakening Dreams listed on Amazon’s Kindle store today, and to know that my work was now available to the world, already plans are at work on the next dream! Several books and miscellaneous other projects call.
Let the dreaming continue!
“You don’t believe in natural talent?”
“The premise can be insidious. If we find something doesn’t come naturally, we might conclude we have no talent for it and abandon the pursuit, even if it’s to our detriment.”
“So what causes success?”
“If you believe in deliberate practice, artfully designed hard work and always stretching beyond your abilities. It’s not as simple as ‘Practice makes perfect.’ It’s continually focusing on your weakest elements and trying to improve them. Those who persevere are high achievers.”
“…The key lies in knowing what you deeply want. The more you want something, the easier it is to sweat through the deliberate practice.”
“So you make your own luck?…”
Kerry Reichs in Leaving Unknown
Kerry seems to be describing Gladwell’s Rule of 10,000. The concept is quite simple. If you put 10,000 hours into something–anything–you will be successful. Whether you begin with ‘natural talent’ or not, those hours (3 hours a day for ten years apparently) will turn you into a master. If you aren’t willing to put in the time, you’re not going to have the success.
This might explain who so many first time novelists are in their 40s. If you’ve been raising kids, you probably haven’t been able to get in your hours!! I tend to think there is something to this. You have to apply yourself to your passion. Luckily, passion makes the hours go quickly.
So what do you think?
I was just making some Jell-o and so I decided to look for some quotes about Jell-o. I arrived at the IMDB site for My Best Friend’s Wedding. I have this DVD in my collection. The pathos and comedy of the relationships in this movie are bittersweet and hilarious. Here are some of my favorite quotes from the movie. I think the fungus one is my favorite. Sometimes we’re fungus. It’s nice to have friends who love us anyway.
FYI: Juliannne is the protagonist who is a writer. Michael is her best friend. Kimmy is Michael’s young fiancee. George is Julianne’s gay editor and the voice of reason.
According to the July 21, 2011 site update from Smashwords.com, they uploaded 6,500 titles in the last 30 days. Wow. I had heard that Amazon was getting 1000 titles a week, but if Smashwords alone uploaded 1625 titles a week in the last month, there must be closer to 2000 titles being uploaded every week.
Wow.
Say it again,
Wow.
That’s a lot of authors taking advantage of the opportunities offered by e-books.
If you have an e-book reader, you already know some of those opportunities for you as a reader: the convenience of carrying an entire library in one slim volume, the ease of acquiring your books, the huge numbers of books available to you, etc. You may also have discovered the pitfalls, in particular the large amount of poorly written books to weed through. The preview is the most valuable defense against this. I dismiss a lot of books a couple pages into the preview.
For an author, there are different considerations. If they are already published, it provides a way for them to release out of print titles. If they are not published, it allows them to skip the long, painful process of waiting for a publisher to take interest in the book, and go straight to the readers.
There’s a problem with this though, because sometimes it isn’t a good idea to go straight to the readers! Too often authors are in love with their words and their ideas and they don’t recognize that they need to edit for flow, form and grammar. There can be a little bit of conceit here or a bit of naivete.
The story has to follow the rules. It has to make sense. It has to be written properly. It has to have good grammar and punctuation. If it doesn’t, the readers are not going to come. If you upload a novel before it’s ready, you’re just shooting yourself in the foot, and earning a reputation as a poor writer.
The easy road can be a dangerous one. The harder road provides enough road blocks for the project to be perfected along the journey.
Of course, we’ve all come across books by reputable publishers that made us shake our heads and wonder how it came to be published. With the e-book scene growing like crazy, hopefully we’ll soon see many talented authors that don’t have paper editions, developing a well-earned following. Those authors aren’t getting there on their own, though. They must have a team of readers and editors helping them to fine-tune their work.
Success is a team effort. In e-book publishing, the author is the one in control of the team, so it’s important that it’s a good one!
If you’re considering e-publishing, there is a lot to know. Read and learn. Ensure that you’re putting out the best possible product. Know your audience and your genre. Be sure that your work has been read and reviewed by your audience. Your reputation is important, you need to keep it shiny.
Readers who aren’t from Calgary are going to be really confused about the weather described in Awakening Dreams. Weather in Calgary is complicated. Here’s a really good youTube video that explains the phenomenon of the Chinook, which brings warm, dry weather and can melt feet of snow in a few hours as temperatures soar to 21 Celsius (~70 Fahrenheit), as well as the reasons why there’s been snow in Calgary every month of the year!.
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I can’t think of many better things to do than to travel the world dancing. How fun is this? Where the Hell is Matt is a blog that shows where Matt is travelling and dancing. This is proof that you don’t have to have a lot of fancy moves to make the activity worthwhile! All you need is a little enthusiasm. Enjoy!
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PS. He’s heading off again, so if you want to join him, fill out this form on his website. His website is, as might be expected, rather entertaining. You will probably enjoy hanging out there.
As you know, Book One of Grace Awakening is on its way. The files have been uploaded to Bookbaby.com for processing and distribution to the various companies where it will be available for sale. There is a contest on the Facebook Fan Page for the first person to post that the listing has shown up on a retail site.
There are now links to all the retail sites available on a Buy It Now page. (Click on the cover, at right). So far, the link for each site just comes up to a fruit-less search, but at some point, Awakening Dreams is going to be there when you click. It is most likely that the earliest successful click will happen Monday, July 24th, but it could be a week or two (or three?) later. We just have to be patient and keep checking.
If you click the links to Kindle, Sony Store, Nook or through your iBook app and find Grace Awakening Book One Awakening Dreams there. Be sure to go to the Facebook Fan Page and declare it! First one to find it and post the site, wins a prize!
I visited my first yurt tonight.
I want one.
A peaceful view of fields and hills. The silence of no electrics buzzing. The organic sense of a round space. The ‘motion’ of the lattice. The span of the ceiling. The light. Ahhhhhh….
I have no idea what I would do with a yurt and where I would put one, but the gypsy in my soul was stirred!
Suddenly I’m looking at view lots and composting toilets. Should I spend $75,000 setting up a lot and a 4 season tent?! lol Probaby not, but it’s tempting!
See if you’re tempted at http://yurtco.com/ Let me know what you think!
Shawn L. Bird 
Norway Peace Invocation July 29, 2011
Tags: invocation, Norway, peace, Rotary, shootings
In the peaceful country of Norway, known for its celebration of progress and innovative thinking, the unthinkable has happened. Promising futures are destroyed by narcissistic, self-deluding ideology
While there is war within a broken heart, peace can not reign within. Let us be mindful of our duty to promote peace within ourselves, for the individual must be at peace before a family can be at peace. A family must be at peace before a land can be at peace. Land must be at peace before a nation can be at peace. Nations must be at peace before the world can be at peace.
Let us take responsibility to mend wounded hearts and share peace with those around us.
Let us be thankful today for the health and safety of those we love, and thankful that the world grieves collectively this injustice. We are still a culture of peace, even amid destruction.
“Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.”
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