Karavansara

4 September 2013
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Writing for a solid target

Targets are important.
Important in general, and important when you are writing.
The basic target for a writer is finishing the damn story, of course*.
But there are other targets – word counts, word per day, are classics.
And then, paying the bills is another extremely good target – highly motivational.

Right now, I’m setting myself a new target – an important one, one for which I feel strongly.
I plan to write and publish enough stories (mostly in English) and non-fiction (mostly in Italian), so that I can put together enough money to go to London in August 2014, and meet my friends for the 2014 WorldCon, also known as Loncon 3.
I have less than 12 months, but I will make it.

I was supposed to go to the Worldcon in Japan, in 2009, but the sudden death of my mother forced me to change my plans.
And this year I had planned a trip to Texas for the 2013 Worldcon – but unfinished business with my university, the horrid state of my country’s finance and the worse state of my own finances forced me to drop that idea too.

Now, I want to go to Loncon 3.
And I think it would be just great to pay for the trip with my writing.

It’s a big target, and one that is very dear to my heart.
But I’ll put everything in to make it.
And now it’s public, I can’t back down.

—————————–
*There’s two kind of writers: those that finish the story, and those that do not.

World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon) (genesedavis.wordpress.com)
Your Role at WorldCon – Bigger Than You Think (murverse.com)
Writing targets and discipline (thrillingwriting.wordpress.com)

3 September 2013
by Davide Mana 5 Comments

Self-publishing according to Chuck Wendig

Author and writing guru Chuck Wendig posted on his blog a good, intelligent, fun list of points to keep in mind when taking the self-publishing path.

Being self-published in this day and age is no longer the albatross around your neck it regrettably was — once, if you told people you were self-published, they’d look at you like you were a smelly old jobless hobo just come off a dusty boxcar with soupcan shoes and a hat made from a coyote skull. Though sometimes even still you get that look, as if the person listening is thinking, oh, you’re one of THOSE.

Called 25 Steps to Becoming a Self-Published Author, it is highly recommended, and I’m posting the link here for future reference.

Writers: You Might Be Doing It Wrong If… ” terribleminds: chuck wendig (poppycockpublishing.com)
My Yoda, Chuck Wendig Is (joybernardo.wordpress.com)

3 September 2013
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Give it and take it cheerfully

A friend of mine posted this on Facebook, and I liked it so much I decided to post it here as a reminder.
It’s from the 1920s, a time in which criticism was not a form of aggression through the web.

Yesterday I was asking about helping my fans lose their shyness.
Now I’d also like to point out that criticism – public or private, in the form of a review posted somewhere or a direct message to the author – is what keeps writers going, and what helps them improving.
Give it and take it cheerfully.

2 September 2013
by Davide Mana 2 Comments

My Shy Fans

You may have noticed a Goodreads Widget appeared in the sidebar here on the right, last week.
I’m not a great Goodreads user – after the initial “feeding frenzy”, the two days solid spent recording all the books I read and listing all the books I’d like to read, I sort of drifted away, and in the last few months I checked my account maybe once every three weeks.

What caused me a certain surprise was finding out, last Thursday, that not only all of my free ebooks are listed in Goodreads, and have quite good ratings, but even my recent short story, Tyrannosaurus Tex, which went on sale through Amazon ten days ago, is there on Goodreads already, and has a great rating!
And I even have four (count’em, four!) self-proclaimed fans of mine.
I have got fans on Goodreads!
And they’ve been there – reviews, ratings and fans – since goodness knows when.
And I did not know about’em!

It certainly never came to me the idea of doing a vanity search, and on Goodreads of all places.
And my fans, and my highly positive reviewers… well they did not even drop me a line!

And it’s weird, because the web is such, right now, that I’m painfully aware of my negative reviews – because having given you a good thrashing, they’re quite happy to let you know about it.
And at the same time, my fans and those that like my work are too shy to get in touch with me.

So I’m taking a moment to send out a belated Thank You, Guys!!

I do not have many readers – but this is fine, as I’m just starting out in the ebook arena, and hopefully more will come.
But as I have a small numbers of readers, it seems to me like a good opportunity for getting to know them.
Because without them, of course, my stories and essays are meaningless, lifeless, useless.

I’ll have to find a way to cure my fans of their shyness.
Any suggestions?
The comments section is always open…

Goodreads (theredbookmark.wordpress.com)

1 September 2013
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

On my (old) radio – A Gun for Dinosaur

Sunday!
Time to relax and listen to the radio.

Here’s a little masterpiece – the X Minus One adaptation of Lyon Sprague de Camp’s classic A Gun for Dinosaur.
The show was recorded in 1956.
Time travel and big game hunting – now those are manly pursuits!

Enjoy!

Dinosaurs exist in the Philippines (micotrip.wordpress.com)

30 August 2013
by Davide Mana 3 Comments

Writing Prompt – Sandstorm

We’re in This Together…

Photo by Steve McCurry

This being the first Karavansara Friday Prompt, it had to feature a camel and a desert, right?
Should you go and write a story or a vignette or a piece of prose or poetry thanks to this picture, please let us know in the comments!

28 August 2013
by Davide Mana 4 Comments

Karavansara’s Friday Prompts

I mentioned my failure in making Plinky work with Karavansara.
A pity, really, because the writing prompts provided by Plinky might stimulate some writing.

But then I got thinking – Karavansara wants to be an original blog.
It’s about storytelling, travel, adventure, pulp, the Orient and other exotic locales.
It’s about mystery and intrigue and the romantic past.
It’s about history, and what-might-have-beens.
It can’t just take any writing prompt.

And so, I said to myself, what the heck, I’ll do my own writing prompts service, and share’em with the surfers – writing prompts tailored on the topics I love, on the stuff I write and I play.
I even have a name for it!
<fanfare, please…>

Karavansara’s Friday Prompts!

Starting… well, this Friday, I’ll post a writing prompt every Friday.
The idea being, you can pick it up and write a short story or something in the weekend.
And if you write it, please drop me a line in the comments, or share a link!

I’m going for photographic prompts… because they are the kind I like best.
But paintings, sketches and even snippets of text will probably appear, too.
Right now, I’ll pick and choose from my Pinterest boards… and might even start a Pinterest Board just for this topic in a few weeks, collecting all the prompts as they come online.

But that’s in the future.
For now, see you on Friday with the first prompt!