Legends of Windemere

The school year started up again for me on Tuesday.  So, I’ve been working hard since then with not much of a chance to write.  Not much energy too.  Part of it simply getting used to waking up early and hitting the ground running.  This is shaping up to be an interesting and fun year though.  So, I should be able to get some writing in once I get my act together and prep the November/December posts.

On the parenting side of things, my son started school yesterday.  He’s got a really good schedule and the classes are rather clear.  There are one or two that have me a little on the nervous side.  This is 8th grade and the difficulty always seems to ramp up immensely to prepare kids for high school.  It’ll take a lot of work and time for my son to get through this because some of the classes won’t be that merciful.  At least, not if I go by the syllabi that he brought home for a few of them.  I expect March to be where I lose most, if not most, of my sanity as usual.

Guess I should get to the writing portion of this post.  This is an author blog even though I haven’t done much publishing and have no idea when I’ll get to it again.  Anyway, I made it up to chapter 13 of 16 in Darwin & the Avenging Elf.  That’s 14 sections, which would normally take me 5 days.  I can finish this by the end of September even if I’m busy.  Saying that means it’ll take me halfway through October.  Thankfully, I stopped right after the set up for the Final Act.  If I can get 2 chapters done in the next week, I’ll be at the final battle.  This is all going to depend on my energy and focus, which wasn’t that great at the start of the week.  Fingers crossed on me having better luck after this weekend.

There were reasons for me being so tired.  I went to a block party for a few hours and had a lot of fun.  This also resulted in me being out in the sun and heat for about 6 hours, which made Sunday and Monday fairly rough.  So, I changed my goal from getting to the end of chapter 13 to simply reaching the start.  I got some writing in during the evenings of my first two days of work, which helped.  That won’t be as common nowadays because my son will need help with his homework.  If that wears me down, I’m not doing anything more than blog prep.  There’s always something, so I have to factor life in more than I used to.  I simply don’t bounce back like I used to.

Another project that I might start tinkering with after I finish writing Darwin & the Avenging Elf is paperbacks.  It’s been recommended that I go through all of my novels (minus the 3-in-1s and smaller books) and use Amazon to give each one a simple paperback option.  I have one almost set up for Beginning of a Hero aside from the one I created through Createspace (R.I.P.) long ago.  The issues are the same as before though:

• I have to make the book 8.5 x 11 size (printer paper size) to work with my formatting and not make these things expensive.
• Even at the large size, I have to price these paperbacks around $15-$20 just to make more than a few cents.  The chunk that Amazon takes out of the royalty is pretty hefty.

Anybody know more about this kind of thing?  I mean, I don’t know if the odd size is going to be that big of a deal breaker.  Let me pause writing this and see what happens if I make it 6×9 size . . .   Yikes.  I’d have to price it no less than $21.00 and that only gives me 0.35 cents royalty for outside stores.  Amazon sales would be $4.55, but that $21.00 price for a 600 page paperback seems like it would turn people off.

Any thoughts on the choices?

• 8.5 x 11 book for $15.  Be over 300 pages.
• 6 x 9 book for $21-$25.  Be 600 pages.

Seriously, I need some input here because I can’t tell, which one is the best route to take if I want to get any sales.  There’s only an 0.11 cent difference with the second option having the higher Amazon royalty.  Should I make a post about this next Sunday to make sure it isn’t lost in this shuffle?

Nothing else to really talk about.  Got my son for the Labor Day weekend.  Next week is diving into work and school.  I’ll inch along with a few things.  My schedule isn’t going to be editing friendly like last year, but I might be able to bring along some outlining stuff to do during my free periods.  If I can outline the next 2-3 Darwin stories before the December break then I’ll be in good shape.  It won’t be writing, but I won’t be idle this time around.

So, what are the goals of the week?

1. Fun weekend with my son.
2. Buying school supplies.
3. Back to work.
4. Homework kicks off too.
5. Get a little writing in if I can.
6. Work on November blog posts.
7. Finish watching ‘Rising of the Shield Hero’.
8. Puzzle time when possible
9. Complete another part of my son’s Halloween costume.