It happened yesterday: a guy saw the light, understood that internet is taking up too much of his life, is too much of a distraction, and he wrote a post about it on his blog.
Then he shared it on Facebook, G+ and a few other social networks.
Basically he spent two hours on the web to tell the web he’s spending too much time on the web.
And yet, I understand the need to filter the noise.
Because the web is a precious tool – for working, playing having a good time or looking at the world.
But the noise is overwhelming.
So, my plan for this august is – turn off the PC for two hours every day, and go through my old CD collection.
Be it classical, jazz, pop, rock, eastern or western, I don’t care.
Music, not noise.
And I’ll start straight away.
Let’s see… Live, by Fleetwood Mac.
After all, my musical life begins with this record.
Ok, it went like this – I was wasting time yesterday morning, on Facebook, having a friendly chat with some author/publisher friends, here in the old C Block of the Italian Blogsphere.
We were talking original ideas, imitation as tribute and nuisance, and all those things, while each one of us was having breakfast at home (isn’t this web-thingie just great?)
Anyway, we were chatting away and sipping cappuccinos, and I really don’t know how it happened, honest, but one thing led to another, and…
So I bet the guys I can write a fantasy novelette in a weekend, and self-publish it on Amazon Kindle in less than a week.
And not only that!
Being an overconfident fool, I bet I can write a novelette that will be the first in a series, featuring a new setting and a new character.
And yes, this is stupid.
I mean, it’s the weekend, it’s summer, there’s 40+ degrees and 90% humidity, I have two deadlines approaching…
Ah! Continue reading →
Today’s post is to let the world know about the launch of the Official Aculeo & Amunet Website, a small thing that went live last night.
There’s a lot of good stuff going on with the series – which as you may know is also known as Peripheries of the Ancient World – and it was high time for Aculeo & Amunet to break free of Karavansara.
I’ll keep posting about my writing and my characters here, but the main action, for the series, will take place on the official website. Continue reading →
A brief report on the status of things, as I’ve been working on the blog (instead of sleeping).
My busman’s holiday is almost over, and in september, I plan to do some major work on Karavansara, tightening the schedule and improving the blog.
When I started Karavansara I did not have a clear plan – I just wanted to jump into the action and try my hand at blogging in English, after seven years as a blogger in my native language, Italian*.
Now the shakedown run is almost over.
The home improvements I started in these days will go on in september, october and november, and by its first birthday this blog will be fully funcional and cruising at full tilt.
As of now…
. Karavansara now has its own mail account – I can’t promise a prompt reply (news travel slowly through the desert), but if really there’s something you can’t tellm or ask me publicly in a comment, now you can mail here…
. Karavansara now features a dedicated Twitter account – you can follow this blog @KaravansaraBlog
. a Zemanta account and plugin should grant better contents, more options, links and stuff on future posts
. I’m are now on Wattpad, which might be a fun way to distribute some of my stuff
. I’ve been toying with Plinky, a fun web-service that provides daily prompts for posts… but Karavansara refuses to share contents with Plinky (or viceversa) so I’ll have to do without**
* I still blog in Italian, on strategie evolutive and on Il Futuro è Tornato
** But writing prompts are something I’d like to feature somehow in Karavansara. I’ll have to work on a few ideas.
*** Yes, you might drop by and gives us a Thumbs Up. It would be nice of you. Thanks in advance.
I’m not particularly hot about pen names.
I happen to like the name my father and my mother gave me – and I like to have my achievements marked with my name.
On the other hand, while the vast majority of my colleagues in academia tend to find my activity as a fiction and gaming author perfectly all right, a few sometimes make a face at the idea.
How can you reconcile your work as a scientist and the fact that you write stories about little green men?
Now, disocunting the facts that
a . finding work as a scientist is getting harder by the hour
b . I never wrote a story about little green men
…
Discounting this, I was saying, I normally reply that I like to think about my readers as smart enough to tell scientific papers from fantasies.
If nothing else, scientific papers tend not to have weapons and monsters in them.
Usually.
But anyway, it can get hawkward.
Also, should things get really going, an author might need a number of alternate identities in order to place his or her stories on a variety of different markets at the same time – or on the same market! Henry Kuttner used at least 21 pseudonyms, often appearing with more than one story in the same magazine, under different names.
So, what if I wanted to find me a pen name?
Is it enough to open the phone directory at random two or three times, jotting down and mixing&matching first and last names?
Well, not exactly.
First, the author’s name on the cover influences the voice in which the reader perceives the narrative.
That’s why romance stories are usually presented as written by female authors – the female “voice” ringing in the reader’s head is considered more or less a given.
Which makes me wonder – is there a connection between the default “voice” of science fiction and fantasy and the fact that a lot of authors go by their initials? H.P. Lovecraft. E.R. Burroughs, C.L. Moore, J.R.R. Tolkien, George R.R. Martin, C.J. Cherry…
Second, the name should fit the genre.
Sometimes it’s clear it’s a pen name, so why not use it to reinforce the product?
P.J. Storm does not write the same genre as Mary Walker.
And as we are at it, and we design our pen name as part of our marketing strategy – let’s check if the name’s already in use on the web.
can we use it as part of our email address, of our website URL, of our Twitter or Facebook account?
Will our alter ego be the first to pop up in a Google search?
All of this, plus the fact that we want our alias to be easy to remember, hard to get wrong (ever thought about what it means to be called J. Michael Straczynski, in terms of typos and bad searches?), and fast to sign (who knows, we may make it big with our stories, and find ourselves at conventions signing huge piles of books for the fans*.)
Finally, we should decide if our pen name will be just that – a name – or if we need to create a full alternate character, with a bio, a photo, the works.
This, again, might be part of our marketing strategy.
We are selling not just the story, but the author.
All of which means, it’s a lot of work.
But – with a little luck – I’ll be doing it soon.
If a certain story sells.
A quick and unusual post this sunday.
I’ve been made aware of an initiative that I think needs all the bandwidth we can give it.
In a nutshell – a man is looking for his brither.
His twin brother.
The two kids were separated, and lost touch with each other.
They were both in Auschwitz, part of Mengele’s twin experimentation project.
So the guy seeking his brother put up a Facebook page.
This is not cute kittens, big-boobed chicks or stupid cosplayers.
This is important.
Karavansara 