Book Signings

Book signings leave me scratching my head. They are sort of like a garage sale, sometimes. I do not like having a garage sale because it is not in my DNA to be a saleswoman.

It is the same with flea markets. I can buy things I like or want, but selling? Not my forte. In fact, I probably give more stuff away at yard sales than I make.

So you can understand my chagrin when I realize that all the sales of my book are up to me. Yes, no publicity nor marketing help from anyone in my corner at this time has left all the finer points to me. This part of being a writer is the hardest of all, in my opinion.

If you are a published author, you probably look forward to book signings so that you can connect with your readers. But what about the author who has self-pubbed or is indie pubbed? Or even those who chose electronic only? What do they do for book signings? In fact, electronic only authors, what do you USE to have a sale in a face-to-face event?

An Unexpected Performance

I am promoting my self-pubbed book, An Unexpected Performance. This weekend I will be at the Bartlett Festival in Bartlett, TN signing and selling. It will be hot. 88 degrees with a heat index of middle 90s.

I am ready, I think. I have my books, bookmarks, and poster. What else can I take?

Goodreads Giveaway - enter to win your print copy today!

Hi, folks!

Do you love to hold a print book in your hands, and when you're done, put it on a special place on your bookshelf?

For those of you who've been wanting to read DON'T LET THE WIND CATCH YOU or UPSTAGED, book 2 in the LeGarde Mystery series,  I'm giving away two print copies of each to winners in the US and Canada. Enter below!

Warmest regards,

Aaron Paul Lazar
www.lazarbooks.com

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Don't Let the Wind Catch You

by Aaron Paul Lazar

Giveaway ends October 15, 2013.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Upstaged

by Aaron Paul Lazar

Giveaway ends October 17, 2013.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

How a Rocket Scientist Becomes a Writer, by Stephanie Osborn

Dear Murderby4 friends, 

Here is another great article by the prolific and talented author, Stephanie Osborn. Stephanie happens to be a fellow writer from Twilight Times Books, and has written many acclaimed titles. Please check out her website to see all of her books. 

This week also happens to be Stephanie's book blast for her Displaced Detective series, be sure to investigate the deals!
 
The Arrival is on sale for $0.99 from 16-20 Sept. then $1.99 until 15 Oct.
At Speed, The Rendlesham Incident, and Endings & Beginnings are on sale for $2.99 from 16Sept-15Oct.

Aaron Lazar

www.lazarbooks.com 

 

 

How a Rocket Scientist Becomes a Writer

copyright 2013, Stephanie Osborn

My first published novel was a SF mystery (I seem to have a fondness for combining those two genres) published by Twilight Times Books back in 2009. Burnout: The mystery of Space Shuttle STS-281 is a techno-thriller about a Space Shuttle disaster that turns out to be no accident.

There's a loooong story behind the writing of Burnout. For one thing, it took me between 10-15 years from the conception of the idea, and the published book.

Why? Simple.

I was too close to it.

Let’s back up a couple decades.

I’d just started working in the field when the Challenger disaster occurred. The program I worked at the time of the disaster was to have led to a Shuttle mission, and I would have been a Payload Specialist candidate. Shortly thereafter, the next phase of my project was cancelled due to the grounding of the Shuttle Fleet. So I moved into the payload flight control area.

Over a couple of decades I worked seven Space Shuttle missions, at least four increments on the International Space Station, and a number of space defense programs. You get into some interesting conversations from time to time.

The seeds of Burnout began as a conversation concerning certain abilities of the Shuttle. It does have an autopilot, and a very limited remote control capability. We discussed under what circumstances a Shuttle could be damaged on orbit and still manage a reasonably safe descent.

Sounds morbid. But the first step to preventing a disaster is to figure out what might cause one, then develop preventive measures and recovery procedures. This means talking about it, working out the details of the malfunction, then working backwards to “fix” it.

And yes, this required considerable knowledge of the guts of a Shuttle. Betwixt us all, we possessed the requisite knowledge. I don't know that we ever did decide whether it was possible.

But that was the birth of the idea. What if I wrote a story about a Shuttle accident, and the ensuing investigation? What sort of accident should it be? Should it cause merely a dangerous, or a catastrophic, malfunction?

And then the idea hit: What if it WASN’T an accident?

And that was when Burnout was born.

My first Shuttle mission was the first Spacelab flight after the post-Challenger Return To Flight. So my research for Burnout included all of the investigative reports and such for that disaster. But I didn’t want anyone thinking I was playing off a tragedy, so I changed the scenario. Whereas Challenger blew during the ascent phase, I’d make my fictional disaster occur during re-entry. I started writing.

So here I was, squarely in the middle of a career in the Shuttle program, writing about a Shuttle disaster. The exact thing that I, as a payload flight controller, did NOT want to see, at least in real life. Certainly not on my watch.

It messes with your head, that.

So I’d write on it awhile, then put it aside when it got to me. I wouldn’t look at it again for months. Then the “plot bunny” would bite again, and I’d pull it out and go at it for awhile.

Somewhere in there, my husband Darrell introduced me to Travis “Doc” Taylor, best-selling science fiction author, TV star of National Geographic’s When Aliens Attack and Rocket City Rednecks and at that time, my husband’s co-worker. Darrell is a graphics artist and does all of the artwork for my book covers, and had done some cover concepts for one of Travis’ books. So when Darrell told Travis I was trying to get published, Travis suggested he introduce us. Darrell did, we clicked, and I acquired a writing mentor.

With that encouragement, I pushed on. Darrell got used to stomping up to me when I was writing: A husband suddenly materializing at my shoulder and saying something is apt to end up with him peeling me from the ceiling.

Eventually I finished a rough draft and sent it to Travis, who’d promised to read it and give me a helpful critique. When he felt it was polished enough, he’d help me further by submitting it to one of his publisher friends. He said he’d been helped like that, and he intended to pass it forward. I promised him I would, too.

So I sent him the Word file and sat back, glad I’d finally gotten the thing finished.

And then, the unthinkable happened.

Columbia went down. And I had a friend aboard.

By that time, I was into military work, or my emotional response might have been even worse. As it was, I put the manuscript away for six months or so. I'd lost TWO friends at one go: KC, and Columbia; because that was the Shuttle with which I'd worked the most.

I talked to Travis later; he said it kinda freaked him too. He went over the whole manuscript in detail, and sent me back a list of compliments, critiques, and suggestions. Unfortunately I wasn’t in any kind of emotional condition to use them. And wouldn’t be for nearly a year.

I seriously considered trashing the manuscript. I downloaded the Columbia Accident Investigation Board’s report and studied it, looking to see if I was way off in left field with my scenario. If I was, then I should probably trash the manuscript anyway. If I wasn’t…

I wasn’t. I didn’t have to change a word.

In the end, I went forward and dedicated the novel to Kalpana and the Columbia crew. I dug up Travis’ notes and printed them out. I had to double the size of the manuscript, which meant essentially writing a whole ‘nother story. So I wrote several stories, and intertwined them in a series of subplots.

I also wrote an afterward in which I basically swore up and down that the book was written BEFORE the accident. I didn’t want anyone prone to conspiracy theories thinking that, as a NASA insider, I’d written the real story of Columbia under the guise of fiction.

And THEN… I sent it to Travis.

The first publisher he sent it to rejected it. Not for any particular flaws in the book; it turns out that 1) they weren’t taking on newbie authors at that time, 2) it didn’t fit the type of book they usually published. That was hard. But I was thankful I had a mentor, because Trav wouldn’t let me get down about it. Instead he sent it to Twilight Times Books. I clearly remember his email going out on a Thursday. On Sunday, the editor in chief, Lida Quillen, sent me an email outlining the standard contract for accepting a book. By Monday, I had my very first book contract in my hands. I was about to become a published author!

Next came a year of reviewing, editing, honing, adding, subtracting, finding a rather large plot hole and plugging it, galley proofs, and being asked to write a book with another author. The Y Factor, co-authored with Darrell Bain, the 2^nd book of the Cresperia Saga begun by Bain and Travis with the award-winning Human By Choice, came out in ebook the same day Burnout came out in ebook and print – Tax Day, 2009. Both hit best-seller lists with various sales groups, and both were favorably reviewed by a syndicated columnist in the New York Times.

Burnout has done rather well in the time it’s been in publication. It’s been nominated for awards in four different genres – ebook, science fiction, mystery, and thriller – and has garnered some interest from Los Angeles. I already have the contract in hand for the sequel, and a screenplay is written for a feature film project.

Burnout’s sequel, tentatively titled Escape Velocity, is in work. The master script is nearly finished (though the shooting script isn’t even begun), and hopefully some producers will be interested in bringing my imagination to cinematic life in the near future. The Y Factor’s sequel, The Cresperian Alliance, is out; I’ve written a book with Travis titled Extraction Point. And I have an entire series, the Displaced Detective saga, in work, with the first story in two volumes, The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival and At Speed, just released.

I left the space program shortly before Travis submitted Burnout for me. Now I write full time, and have 10 books, novel and anthology, under my belt. From rocket scientist to author in a couple of years’ time.

Not too shabby, I suppose.


***

Check out Stephanie's Sherlock Holmes series:

The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival

The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: The Rendlesham Incident

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings

 

Books 5-7 are in work, and are entitled:

A Case of Spontaneous Combustion

A Little Matter of Earthquakes

The Adventure of Shining Mountain Lodge

Also Osborn is working on concepts for an additional 3-4 books in the series.

 Stephanie OsbornInterstellar Woman of Mystery
See all her books at http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com  

 

Few can claim the varied background of Stephanie Osborn, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery. 

Veteran of more than 20 years in the civilian space program, as well as various military space defense programs, she worked on numerous space shuttle flights and the International Space Station, and counts the training of astronauts on her resumé. Her space experience also includes Spacelab and ISS operations, variable star astrophysics, Martian aeolian geophysics, radiation physics, and nuclear, biological, and
chemical weapons effects.

Stephanie holds graduate and undergraduate degrees in four sciences:
astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics, and she is “fluent” in several
more, including geology and anatomy.

In addition she possesses a license of ministry, has been a duly sworn, certified police officer, and is a National Weather Service certified storm spotter.

Her travels have taken her to the top of Pikes Peak, across the world’s highest suspension bridge, down gold mines, in the footsteps of dinosaurs, through groves of giant Sequoias, and even to the volcanoes of the Cascade Range in the Pacific Northwest, where she was present for several phreatic eruptions of Mount St. Helens.

Now retired from space work, Stephanie has trained her sights on writing. She has authored, co-authored, or contributed to more than 20 books, including the celebrated science-fiction mystery, Burnout: The Mystery of Space Shuttle STS-281. She is the co-author of the “Cresperian Saga,” book series, and currently writes the critically acclaimed “Displaced Detective” series, described as “Sherlock Holmes meets The X-Files.” She recently released the paranormal/horror novella El Vengador, based on a true story, as an ebook.

In addition to her writing work, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery now happily “pays it forward,” teaching math and science through numerous media including radio, podcasting and public speaking, as well as working with SIGMA, the science-fiction think tank.

The Mystery continues.

 

Tidbits They Don’t Tell You In Author’s School By Stephanie Osborn

Dear Murderby4 friends, 

Here's a "lessons learned" article by Stephanie Osborn. Stephanie, thanks for stopping by to share your wisdom with our readers!

This week also happens to be Stephanie's book blast for her Displaced Detective series, be sure to investigate the deals!

The Arrival is on sale for $0.99 from 16-20 Sept. then $1.99 until 15 Oct.
At Speed, The Rendlesham Incident, and Endings & Beginnings are on sale for $2.99 from 16Sept-15Oct.

Aaron Lazar

www.lazarbooks.com 

 

The Interstellar Woman of Mystery

http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

I’m a pretty decent writer. And well before I decided to submit a novel manuscript for publication, I did my homework. I knew about query letters, slush piles, and house formats. I knew some publishing houses don’t take unagented submissions and some do. I knew how to find the correct name and address for a submission, and to address the query letter TO that person. I knew how to make my query letter POP.

But once I got into the industry (translated – I had a manuscript under contract), I discovered that there are a few little details they don’t tell you in author’s school.

Sub-tidbit: Everybody knows not to trust spelling and grammar checkers, right? They don’t know there from they’re from their… (finish the statement on your own). Good. ‘Nuff said. On to the serious stuff.

Tidbit One: Different publishers have different definitions of what constitutes novel length. For some, it’s anything over forty thousand words. For others, it’s sixty, and for most in my genre (science fiction and mystery, often combined) it’s around one hundred thousand. This is a rough rule of thumb, and generally the bigger the number, the more leeway you have, plus or minus, in your word count. But make sure you know what the definition is for your genre, and MAKE IT LONG ENOUGH, or you could run into problems.

Tidbit Two: It IS possible to have a novel that’s TOO LONG. You see, there’s a bit of alchemy mixed into publishing. There’s some arcane formula publishers use to transmute word count into page count. Page count, in turn, converts to shelf space. Use up too much shelf space on one book, and the publisher suddenly can’t display as many books. So your wonderful, two hundred thousand plus word count book that spewed out of you like water from a fire hose probably isn’t usable, unless you can find a way to cut it down into two or three books.

Tidbit Three: There is a pecking order among authors, and it is not entirely determined by tenure, sales figures and awards. Who published you? How big was your last advance? (This is, not coincidentally, often determined by the size of the publishing house.) The bigger the publishing house, the larger your advance, the higher up the pecking order you are – at least in the minds of some. Be prepared to experience resentment from those below you, and disdain from those above. Some of us view the playing field as level – but not all.

Tidbit Four: The old adage, “You can’t get published without an agent, and you can’t get an agent without being published,” isn’t true – but it isn’t far from it. Many of the big publishers won’t even look at anything that isn’t handed to them by an agent. With some of them, it’s impossible to even find contact information for the budding author. Contrariwise, most agents won’t look at anyone who isn’t published. But there are some good publishing houses out there that DO accept unagented submissions. The trick to these is that, unless you know somebody, your submission goes into a “slush pile” and will remain there for some time. Slush pile submissions are read in the order received, so your baby will be there for however long it takes for the company’s readers to dig down to it. So be prepared to be patient.

Tidbit Five: A mentor helps. He or she should be someone already experienced in the business, and willing to take on a protégé. HE is the “somebody you know,” your entrée into the business. He can act as your reviewer, your advisor, your agent, your friend, and your shoulder to cry on when an editor says your beloved baby is a pile of horse manure.

Tidbit Five-A: Editors do sometimes say this. Or words to that effect.

Your mentor can point you in new directions, and tell you if and when someone is trying to take advantage of you. Sometimes he even becomes a co-author, and then it’s really fun.

Tidbit Six: Getting a contract in hand is NOT the end of the job. It’s the beginning. Or maybe the middle.

Because now you get to work with one or more editors, copy editors, and proofreaders. Multiple times. Read: for as many iterations as it takes to get the book into the condition that the publishers consider ready for publication.

Tidbit Six-A: Be aware that you are NOT required to do everything, or even anything, the editors say. But you better really be confident you’ve done it exactly right, because these guys are more experienced than you are and know what they’re doing.

So you have the book edited, it’s in gorgeous shape; the cover art has come down and it’s beautiful. You’re done, right? Nope. Now you get the e-ARC, the electronic Advanced Review Copy. You get to review that, make corrections, and send the corrections back.

NOW you’re done? No. Now you get the galley prints. These are unbound first run prints of your book. Again, review for errors and send back the corrections.

Meanwhile, you and your publisher are working on the public relations and publicity campaign. Start making appearances before the book is released if you want to build buzz. Build a website. Blog. Tweet. Face. Space. Link. Plus. Pin. Good. Net. Ning. Tag. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, you need to find out.) If you can find a way to get your name out there, and to get your book’s name out there, do it.

After the book comes out come the interviews, talks, and book signings.

Somewhere in there, you start writing your next book.

Tidbit Seven: You NEVER really get done.

Tidbit Eight: Once you’ve realized Tidbits One through Seven, you are now an experienced, professional author.

***

http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

The Displaced Detective Series by Stephanie Osborn is a science fiction mystery in which the brilliant hyperspatial physicist, Dr. Skye Chadwick, discovers that there are alternate realities, and said alternates are often populated by those we consider only literary characters. Her pet research, Project: Tesseract, hidden deep under Schriever AFB, is her means of looking in on these continua. In one particular reality, continuum 114, a certain Victorian detective (who, in fact, exists in several continua) was to have died along with his arch-nemesis at the Reichenbach Falls. Knee-jerking, Skye intervenes, rescuing her hero Sherlock Holmes, who inadvertently flies through the tesseract wormhole connecting his universe with ours, while his enemy Professor James Moriarty plunges to his death. Unable to send Holmes back without causing devastating continuum collapse due to non-uniqueness, he must stay in our world and learn to adapt to the 21st century. Hijinks ensue, and the series has been aptly described as “Sherlock Holmes meets the X-Files,” as he and Chadwick take on modern spy rings, UFOs, mass spontaneous combustion, and more.

Osborn’s take on the series, in her own words, is “an attempt to see how far I could stretch Holmes without breaking him. I wanted to put him in a situation that would drive most men mad, and see what he would do. He definitely rose to the occasion.”

Books 1-4 of the series have been released:

The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival

The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: The Rendlesham Incident

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings

 

Books 5-7 are in work, and are entitled:

A Case of Spontaneous Combustion

A Little Matter of Earthquakes

The Adventure of Shining Mountain Lodge

Also Osborn is working on concepts for an additional 3-4 books in the series.

 Stephanie OsbornInterstellar Woman of Mystery
See all her books at http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com  

 

Few can claim the varied background of Stephanie Osborn, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery.

Veteran of more than 20 years in the civilian space program, as well as various military space defense programs, she worked on numerous space shuttle flights and the International Space Station, and counts the training of astronauts on her resumé. Her space experience also includes Spacelab and ISS operations, variable star astrophysics, Martian aeolian geophysics, radiation physics, and nuclear, biological, and
chemical weapons effects.

Stephanie holds graduate and undergraduate degrees in four sciences:
astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics, and she is “fluent” in several
more, including geology and anatomy.

In addition she possesses a license of ministry, has been a duly sworn, certified police officer, and is a National Weather Service certified storm spotter.

Her travels have taken her to the top of Pikes Peak, across the world’s highest suspension bridge, down gold mines, in the footsteps of dinosaurs, through groves of giant Sequoias, and even to the volcanoes of the Cascade Range in the Pacific Northwest, where she was present for several phreatic eruptions of Mount St. Helens.

Now retired from space work, Stephanie has trained her sights on writing. She has authored, co-authored, or contributed to more than 20 books, including the celebrated science-fiction mystery, Burnout: The Mystery of Space Shuttle STS-281. She is the co-author of the “Cresperian Saga,” book series, and currently writes the critically acclaimed “Displaced Detective” series, described as “Sherlock Holmes meets The X-Files.” She recently released the paranormal/horror novella El Vengador, based on a true story, as an ebook.

In addition to her writing work, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery now happily “pays it forward,” teaching math and science through numerous media including radio, podcasting and public speaking, as well as working with SIGMA, the science-fiction think tank.

The Mystery continues.

 

The Origins of the Displaced Detective, by Stephanie Osborn, The Interstellar Woman of Mystery

Dear Murderby4 friends, 

Today I'd like to introduce an incredibly prolific and talented author, Stephanie Osborn. Stephanie happens to be a fellow writer from Twilight Times Books, and has written many acclaimed titles. Please check out her website to see all of her books. 

This week also happens to be Stephanie's book blast for her Displaced Detective series, which I've just started reading. I'm thoroughly enjoying getting to know Mr. Sherlock Holmes in a new time zone. Wait - you'll hear more about it below.  

The Arrival is on sale for $0.99 from 16-20 Sept. then $1.99 until 15 Oct. 

At Speed, The Rendlesham Incident, and Endings; Beginnings are on sale for $2.99 from 16Sept-15Oct. Check out the side bar on the left for buy links.

Please join me in welcoming Stephanie today!

Aaron Lazar

www.lazarbooks.com 

 

 

The Origins of the Displaced Detective

copyright 2013, Stephanie Osborn

 

I suppose the first thing you should know about me is that, well, I really AM one of those rocket scientists you hear about. With degrees in four sciences and subspecialties in a couple more, I worked in the civilian and military space industries, sitting console in the control centers, training astronauts, you name it; and I lost a friend aboard Columbia, when she broke up over Texas. So yeah, I’m the real deal.

The second thing you need to know about me is that I’ve been a Sherlock Holmes fan… aficionado, whatever word you prefer… since I was a kid. Someone gave me a copy of The Hound of the Baskervilles for my birthday one year. I was in, what, third grade? With a hyperactive imagination. Scared me to death when I read it. But I loved Holmes immediately. If I could have done away with the scary story about the Hound, I’d have adored that book even then. It’s one of my favorites now.

By the time I was in high school, I’d discovered that big, single-volume compendium ― you know, the one with the rust-and-mustard dust jacket? If you’re a Holmes aficionado, you know the one I mean. If you don’t, go find it! I read it cover to cover. Wagged it around to every class with me, and every time I had 2 consecutive spare minutes, my nose was in it. Oh, I was devastated when I read The Final Problem. No, really: I went into mourning, like I’d lost family! And I could have turned handsprings for joy when I read The Empty House! Many years later, I acquired that same rust-and-mustard volume and placed it on my own shelves, where it has been read cover to cover many more times. I picked up what are known as “pastiches,” too, efforts by other authors to carry on the adventures, or create entirely new ones, or fill in gaps. (What did Holmes and Watson do when the Martians invaded? What about Jack the Ripper, and why did Watson never chronicle an adventure about him? Didn’t Holmes go after him? What really happened with the Giant Rat of Sumatra?) I watched television and movies ― to this day, I watch the BBC’s Sherlock, and CBS’ Elementary, and even the Guy Ritchie film franchise starring Robert Downey, Jr. And I have the complete set of the Grenada series starring Jeremy Brett, and a bunch of the Basil Rathbone films. Good, bad, or indifferent, they’re all Holmes!

Now, back in Arthur Conan Doyle’s day, they didn’t have all the breakdown of literature into genres that we have today. Today we have science fiction (or SF, with its many subdivisions), fantasy, horror, and such. But all those, in the Victorian era, were lumped together and considered speculative fiction, or “specfic” as it’s known today. As it turns out, many if not most of the Holmes adventures would be considered as specfic ― and I started thinking… 

…Other people have “done” Holmes in Victorian-era science fiction...

…But I want to be different. If I write Holmes, I want to do something that’s never been done before…

…Aha. What if, somehow, I could manage to drag Holmes into the modern world to go adventuring?

How to do it…how to do it… 

I researched and I studied. And then it hit me. 

What if I use the concept of alternate realities, which more and more scientific data indicates are real, and I combine that with something called M theory in order to be able to access them… 

…And I was off!

I already had several novels written but unsold by that point, and there was publisher interest in my first one, Burnout: The mystery of Space Shuttle STS-281. (Yes, I like to mix science fiction and mystery. It seems to come naturally to me; I’ve always thought a good SF story has a distinct element of the mysterious. That’s why I got dubbed The Interstellar Woman of Mystery by certain media personalities.) So I knew about writing novels: See, it isn’t about page count, it’s about word count.

Different genres define book length by different word counts. YA is relatively short, say 50,000-80,000 words. The romance genre generally defines a novel at roughly the same word count. But SF and mystery, for instance, consider a novel to run from about 80,000-110,000 words, maybe a smidge more. (Think about the thinness of a typical Harlequin Romance as compared to, say, a Baen military SF novel.) There’s an arcane formula that ties word count to final page count, and another that determines the list price from the page count. So these are important numbers, these word counts.

Now that’s not to say that you can’t go over; you can… provided your last name is something like King, Weber, or Rowling. Because publishers know those names will sell books regardless of length. Everybody else? Don’t be too short OR too long.

So I sat down to write The Case of the Displaced Detective, the first story in what has become my Displaced Detective series, described rather aptly as, “Sherlock Holmes meets the X-Files.”

Two months ― yes, you read that right, months, not years ― later, I’d completed the rough draft… and it stood at 215,000 words. Writing that manuscript was kinda like tryin’ to hold a wide-open fire hose all by yourself. I ate at the computer. I all but slept at the computer. That story just came pouring out. I couldn’t stop until it was all written. By the time I’d polished it, it had ballooned up to around 245,000 words, and I managed to whack it down to about 230,000.

But it was too big for a single book. And nobody could figure out how to cut it down without cutting out essential parts ― not me, not agent, not editor, not publisher. See, it was really two stories in one: it was an “origin story” of sorts, how Holmes came to be in the 21^st century, AND it had a mystery. It needed all of those 230,000 words to tell the story properly.

In the end, my publisher and I decided to make two volumes of it. That’s why, when you look at the covers, you don’t just see The Arrival, or At Speed. You see The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival, and The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed. There’s not a hard and fast break between the origin story and the mystery; in fact the mystery starts within days of Holmes landing in the 21^st century in The Arrival, and he is still trying to come to terms with everything in At Speed.

Then I went on to write the next story, The Case of the Cosmological Killer.

And durned if the same thing didn’t happen! Only this one took a smidge longer, because it was interrupted by an illness. All told I think it took about a year or so. And so books 3 & 4 are The Case of the Cosmological Killer: The Rendlesham Incident, and The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings.

I swear they’re not all going to be two volumes! In fact I just turned in A Case of Spontaneous Combustion, and it’s one volume only! I’ve started on book 6, A Little Matter of Earthquakes, and book 7, The Adventure of Shining Mountain Lodge, is mostly finished and awaiting the publication of 5 & 6. And I’m planning for adventures beyond that.

So in a manner of speaking, I suppose I’m still adventuring with my old pal Sherlock Holmes… only now he’s investigating mysteries that are more on MY turf! And I plan to do so until we both retire to the Sussex downs to keep bees!

http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

The Displaced Detective Series by Stephanie Osborn is a science fiction mystery in which the brilliant hyperspatial physicist, Dr. Skye Chadwick, discovers that there are alternate realities, and said alternates are often populated by those we consider only literary characters. Her pet research, Project: Tesseract, hidden deep under Schriever AFB, is her means of looking in on these continua. In one particular reality, continuum 114, a certain Victorian detective (who, in fact, exists in several continua) was to have died along with his arch-nemesis at the Reichenbach Falls. Knee-jerking, Skye intervenes, rescuing her hero Sherlock Holmes, who inadvertently flies through the tesseract wormhole connecting his universe with ours, while his enemy Professor James Moriarty plunges to his death. Unable to send Holmes back without causing devastating continuum collapse due to non-uniqueness, he must stay in our world and learn to adapt to the 21st century. Hijinks ensue, and the series has been aptly described as “Sherlock Holmes meets the X-Files,” as he and Chadwick take on modern spy rings, UFOs, mass spontaneous combustion, and more.

Osborn’s take on the series, in her own words, is “an attempt to see how far I could stretch Holmes without breaking him. I wanted to put him in a situation that would drive most men mad, and see what he would do. He definitely rose to the occasion.”

Books 1-4 of the series have been released:

The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival

The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: The Rendlesham Incident

The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings

 

Books 5-7 are in work, and are entitled:

A Case of Spontaneous Combustion

A Little Matter of Earthquakes

The Adventure of Shining Mountain Lodge

Also Osborn is working on concepts for an additional 3-4 books in the series.

Stephanie Osborn: Interstellar Woman of Mystery 

See all her books at http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com   

Few can claim the varied background of Stephanie Osborn, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery.

Veteran of more than 20 years in the civilian space program, as well as various military space defense programs, she worked on numerous space shuttle flights and the International Space Station, and counts the training of astronauts on her resumé. Her space experience also includes Spacelab and ISS operations, variable star astrophysics, Martian aeolian geophysics, radiation physics, and nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons effects.

Stephanie holds graduate and undergraduate degrees in four sciences: astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics, and she is “fluent” in several more, including geology and anatomy.

In addition she possesses a license of ministry, has been a duly sworn, certified police officer, and is a National Weather Service certified storm spotter.

Her travels have taken her to the top of Pikes Peak, across the world’s highest suspension bridge, down gold mines, in the footsteps of dinosaurs, through groves of giant Sequoias, and even to the volcanoes of the Cascade Range in the Pacific Northwest, where she was present for several phreatic eruptions of Mount St. Helens.

Now retired from space work, Stephanie has trained her sights on writing. She has authored, co-authored, or contributed to more than 20 books, including the celebrated science-fiction mystery, Burnout: The Mystery of Space Shuttle STS-281. She is the co-author of the “Cresperian Saga,” book series, and currently writes the critically acclaimed “Displaced Detective” series, described as “Sherlock Holmes meets The X-Files.” She recently released the paranormal/horror novella El Vengador, based on a true story, as an ebook.

In addition to her writing work, the Interstellar Woman of Mystery now happily “pays it forward,” teaching math and science through numerous media including radio, podcasting and public speaking, as well as working with SIGMA, the science-fiction think tank.

The Mystery continues.

 

Cover Reveal for A.F. Stewarts' FAIRY TALE FUSION

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COVER REVEAL!!

Welcome to Fairy Tale Fusion.

Where things get messy in the Riding Hood.

What if the characters in Fairy Tales existed? What if they lived and breathed in a place called Fairyland, a setting not too divergent from our world, situated next to Wonderland and down the lane from Camelot?

Meet Detective Piper, member of the Fairyland Metro Police. His job, to ferret out the suspects and investigate crime on the streets and in the lanes of Fairyland. Along with Officer Simon, he’s hard at work, searching for a missing pumpkin, hunting for an arsonist, wondering what the future holds in a series of crystal ball robberies, and dealing with spells, curses and other strange happenings.

Here's the link to the book page:

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/356889

Fairy Tale Fusion will be available soon for pre-orders on Kobo, Barnes and Noble and iTunes

What An Editor Can Do For You . . . If You Let Her By Dora Machado

copyright 2013, Dora Machado

 by Dora Machado

When it comes to editors, I haven’t always a believer. As a writer, part of me assumed that if you needed an editor, you weren’t ready for prime time. The smarter part of me suspected that the cocky part of me was being—well—cocky. So a few years back, I decided to challenge my assumptions and hired an editor to review my manuscript prior to submission. Wow. The mind-blowing, eye-opening experience resulted in the award-winning Stonewiser series.  I realized that, no matter how well you write, every author can benefit from having an editor, and a qualified, experienced, insightful editor can impact both a story and an author in profound and lasting ways.

Of course, the editing experience has a lot to do with the quality of the editor, the interaction between the writer and the editor, and the author’s ability to capitalize on the editor’s advice. I have been extremely fortunate to work with some of the best editors in my genre, but I have to credit my publisher, Lida Quillen of Twilight Times Books, for making this latest match. When she assigned Barb Caffrey to edit The Curse Giver, she brought together two experienced, opinionated, passionate lovers of the fantasy genre with stubborn streaks, high standards and even higher expectations. I have to wonder: Either Lida Quillen is a troublemaker or she’s the wisest publisher on the planet.

Generally speaking, an editor’s contributions range from the very simple to the very complex. Writer’s ego aside, a good editor will always remind us of the basic principles of writing and the pesky details we might overlook when submerged in our manuscript’s depths. I’m always surprised—not to mention embarrassed—by the simple finds, the nits, typos and common mistakes my editor catches. I blame writer’s myopia for those easy-to-fix bloopers. When you’ve read the same paragraph twenty-six times, the eye doesn’t see what’s before it anymore, but rather what the mind thinks the eye should see. I might be sharp and thrive at self-editing, but once the eyes go numb, self-editing becomes a delusion.

Beyond the simple contributions, an editor has a lot more to offer, not just to the author but to the story. A good editor can offer perspective and objectivity, which can often become casualties of the creative process. Objectivity is an important quality when evaluating a story. It’s not about how well the story is written. It’s about how well the story reads, how it flows—not in your author’s mind, where the movie has played so many times—but in the virgin mind, where the story runs what can sometimes be a very different course through a new geography.

This is exactly what happened when Barb Caffrey read The Curse Giver‘s manuscript. She pointed out the strengths right away—assets I immediately wanted to preserve during the editing process. But she also sensed a weakness, a kink in the story’s flow, a blind spot for the reader that didn’t exist in my author’s mind because I knew the story’s outcome all along.

Barb recommended that I add a new point of view to the story. I gasped when I got her e-mail. I imagined my word count—the bane of my writer’s existence—soaring. I thought about all the work it was going to take to integrate this new point of view into the story, the details I would have to tweak, the time and energy I would have to spend . . .

I sat on my author’s indignation for a whole five minutes before I began to consider the suggestion in earnest. I had been sort of wondering if The Curse Giver‘s first few chapters were strong enough to capture the reader’s mind and launch them into the grand adventure that awaited them. You know an editor is gifted when she jabs that needle directly into your nerve. You know she is exceptional when she answers the very question you feared asking.

“Okay, all right.” I took several deep breaths and forced my mind open. “So maybe Barb has a point.”
I had the perfect character built into the story to develop a new point of view.  As Barb pointed out, I could keep my word count down by using the new point of view sparingly in a ruthless and utilitarian approach. She kindly encouraged me to at least give it a try. It doesn’t hurt when your editor combines excellence and kindness, so I sat down, wrote out the new POV, and tested it by inserting it in the story.

I purred like a satisfied kitten when I reread the amended story. My questions were answered. My doubts were put to rest. The story flowed beautifully. The new point of view strengthened and clarified the opening chapters, supporting the early development of the reader’s trance. Added bonus? Readers loved Severo, and they routinely tell me how much they like this quirky character who got his own POV at the last minute, courtesy of Barb Caffrey.

If you are a writer, you know that writing requires continuous self-development. Our trade demands the highest standards of critical review and our stories are improved by a rigorous editing process. An editor can provide all of that and more, especially if she has tons of practical experience in the genre, is a good fit to your style, and has secured your trust with high-impact recommendations. In addition, a good editor helps you build confidence in your writing. But remember, editing works only if the author is open to changes and suggestions. Take it from me:  An editor can improve your writing and your manuscript . . . but only if you let her.


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Dora Machado is the award winning author of the epic fantasy Stonewiser series and her newest novel, The Curse Giver, available from Twilight Times Books July 2013. She grew up in the Dominican Republic, where she developed a fascination for writing and a taste for Merengue. After a lifetime of straddling such compelling but different worlds, fantasy is a natural fit to her stories. She lives in Florida with her husband and three very opinionated cats. To learn more about Dora Machado and her novels, visit her website at www.doramachado.com or contact her at Dora@doramachado.com.  

Subscribe to her blog at http://www.doramachado.com/blog/ sign up for her at newsletter at http://doramachado.com/newsletter.php, Facebook and Twitter.

For a free excerpt of The Curse Giver, visit  http://twilighttimesbooks.com/TheCurseGiver_ch1.html.