Filed under: Amazon, Babylon 5, Connections, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, movies, Publishing, Science Fiction, Space, Survival, YouTube | Tags: Amazon, Babylon 5, blogging, Bruce Willis, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, Milla Jovovich, movies, promotion, Roman, Science Fiction, space, St. Cybi's Well, The Fifth Element, V for Vendetta, video, writing, www youtube
“V”, it is said, is for “victory.”
It’s also for Vendetta.
No, it’s not for that dreadful miniseries. Or the TV series. Gah. Why did you have to remind me of that???
It’s also for “5“. As in Babylon. As in the number of days remaining in my Kickstarter.
And as in elements. I think this Fifth Element bit says it best:
Yes, some things *are* worth saving.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Health, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, humor, hyperdactylism, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, Latin, literature, mutant, polydactylism, science, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well
Weird little trivia bit: I was born with six toes on my left foot.
No, really. Six toes. Which is a fairly uncommon condition known variously as polydactylism or hyperdactylism. Personally, I prefer to think of it as being sexy — from the Latin.
What’s even more unusual about this, is that in my case it wasn’t just a little fleshy lump of a toe. Nope. It was complete with bones and joints — including a complete extra metatarsal structure. Which I still have, though they removed the toe itself when I was a few weeks old. This factoid has been known to get some podiatrists entirely too excited.
So, yeah, I’m some kinda mutant. Just a weird little bit of trivia to share on this Day Six of our Countdown.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Augmented Reality, Connections, Humor, Kindle, Music, Promotion, Publishing, Religion, Science Fiction, Society, Writing stuff, YouTube | Tags: Amazon, augmented reality, blogging, Carl Jung, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, humor, jim downey, Jungian psychology, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, music, promotion, Roman, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, Synchronicity, The Police, video, writing, www youtube
Today is October 8th.
October used to be the 8th month. That it is now the 10th month played havoc with my mind when I was a kid, since I knew damned good and well that “octo” meant “eight”. It wasn’t logical. It didn’t make sense. This may well have been my first conscious awareness that reality was kinda screwed-up. Seriously.
It is also, as it happens, day 8 in our little count-down. No, I didn’t plan it that way.
At least not consciously.
So, that brings us to this:
Have a good Monday.
Jim Downey
*Just in case. And yeah, Jung’s ideas run all through my fiction. Obviously.
Filed under: Amazon, Failure, Feedback, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, free, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, promotion, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, writing
This is what it said on the ‘$1 Reward’ for my Kickstarter:
Amnesty: Did you download “Communion of Dreams” for free? Assuage your guilty conscience and/or show your appreciation for a great book by pledging just one dollar. And if you haven’t gotten a download of “Communion of Dreams” yet, do so!
That, friends, is why I usually leave the comedy writing to the other Jim Downey, the one who has a more mainstream sense of humor. I was trying to have a little fun with the standard $1 Reward you find on most Kickstarters, where it says some nice but fairly generic thing about “thanking you for your support.” I should know better. The joke fell flat.
Since you can’t change an offered Reward once someone has claimed it (which is only fair), I’ve just closed that Reward and added a more typical one at the same contribution level:
A digital thank-you for your support, as well as notification when “St. Cybi’s Well” is available to the public!
So, lesson learned. Again. You’d think I’d know by now to leave the humor to the other guy.
Thanks to those who *did* make a contribution to the Kickstarter yesterday! That amounted to $365 towards the goal — very much appreciated! And there were another 167 downloads of Communion of Dreams through the day, as well!
Onward & upward.
Jim Downey*
Filed under: Art, Astronomy, Bad Astronomy, Ballistics, Connections, Failure, Feedback, General Musings, Humor, Light pollution, Predictions, Promotion, Science, Science Fiction, Space, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: art, blogging, Communion of Dreams, humor, jim downey, literature, Moon, Paint the Moon, predictions, Randall Munroe, science, Science Fiction, space, technology, Wikipedia, xkcd
Didn’t I just say that Randall Monroe is brilliant? Of course I did. That was writing about his artwork. And this morning he proved (once again) that his science is solid, as well:
Er, let me explain…
Monroe does the popular webcomic xkcd. If you don’t read it regularly, you should. Anyway, this summer he added in another feature called “What If?” which he explains with this subtitle: “Answering your hypothetical questions with physics, every Tuesday.”
And for whatever reason, today’s entry is in response to this question: “If every person on Earth aimed a laser pointer at the Moon at the same time, would it change color?”
Gee … where have I heard that question before? Hmm … perhaps in Chapter 9 of Communion of Dreams?
“You know, I could design a program that would enhance the image. Everyone who looked up at that would see our Moon,instead. Wouldn’t take much. I could even paint it red.”
“Paint it red? You mean the Moon?
“Yeah, old joke. There was this artist back at the turn of the century who had this project called ‘Paint the Moon’. He wanted to get everyone in the Western Hemisphere to focus these popular little hand-held laser pointers on the Moon all at once, with the idea that enough of the laser light would cause a red spot to appear. Had it all figured: what phase of the Moon was best to do it, how people could aim their lasers, the whole bit.”
“Crazy,” said Jon. Then, after a pause, “It didn’t work, did it?”
“Nah. But that wasn’t the point. He always described the project as a ‘shared lyrical fantasy’, designed to bring people together for a single moment, all doing the same thing. The first attempt got quite a lot of attention world-wide from the media. Millions heard about it, and maybe tens of thousands participated. It is still considered a seminal art event – we studied it in school.”
“But . . . what’s the point?”
“Oh, I just always liked that grandiose sense of whimsy. There were a number of crazy things like that back then, before everything went to hell.”
Unsurprisingly, Monroe concludes that the laser pointers wouldn’t accomplish the task. But then he uses that as a jumping-off point to explore what it *would* take to accomplish the task. And then some. It’s a fun piece, and likely the image of his I posted above has just become another instant classic, not unlike this one (which is the not-xkcd-approved Official T-shirt of BBTI).
Jim Downey
PS: Thanks to the people who sent me a link to the xkcd What If? entry this morning — very much appreciated. Now, if anyone would like to pop by the xkcd forums and mention this connection, I’d greatly appreciate it. Cheers!
Filed under: Art, Humor, Jupiter, Man Conquers Space, Paleo-Future, Predictions, Science Fiction, SETI, Space | Tags: humor, predictions, Science Fiction, space, travel
It’s been a while, how about a little “paleo-future” fun?
Frank R. Paul was an illustrator of US pulp magazines in the science fiction field. He was born in Vienna, Austria… Frank R. Paul was influential in defining what both cover art and interior illustrations in the nascent science fiction pulps of the 1920s looked like.
That’s from a post a couple years ago which is quite delightful — though a bit dated (they even include Pluto as a planet, imagine!) — that you should check out: http://ubersuper.com/retro-futurism/
Jim Downey
Filed under: Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality, Brave New World, Fermi's Paradox, General Musings, Humor, Predictions, Science, Science Fiction, SETI, Society, Space, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: augmented reality, blogging, Communion of Dreams, Fermi's Paradox, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, predictions, Rich Terrile, science, Science Fiction, simulation, space, technology, writing
Interesting article, all in all. But I particularly had a chuckle over this bit:
Beings with whom you could interact?
Maybe, or maybe I’d just let them go. They’d be living out their lives in an incredibly short amount of time. Maybe I could change the physical laws. I could make them live in places both hospitable and inhospitable. I could make it so that they’re completely alone—perhaps that’s a boundary condition for us, and explains why there are no aliens.
Hehehehehehe. Yeah, maybe it does. Maybe it does.
Kickstarter is almost ready. Watch for an announcement soon.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Weather | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, predictions, promotion, reviews, Science Fiction, writing
That’s how the email started. Here’s part of how it continued:
Just completed Communion Of Dreams, and was delighted with the story! In fact, I sat with my Kindle, a good pipe and spent the time to read it front to back in one sitting. Its been a long time since I found a story that captivated me like this, a joy to read and keep. Thanks for the wonderful work, this is what good fiction is all about, a storyteller with a good tale and and time to enjoy the story in the telling.
It’s always good to hear from people, to get feedback. Particularly when they so obviously have such good taste and discerning judgment. 😉
Isaac has arrived. I think already today we’ve had more rain than we’ve had in the previous two months, perhaps longer. Last I checked the forecast is for another 4″ or more over the course of the weekend.
No flooding yet. Not of either the weather nor the ideas variety.
That’s OK. These things arrive when they do, like kindly reviews and comments in the email.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Artificial Intelligence, Feedback, Gardening, Humor, Italy, Marketing, movies, Promotion, Science Fiction, Titan, Travel, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, direct publishing, gardening, humor, Italy, jim downey, Kindle, literature, promotion, reviews, Science Fiction, travel, TV, writing
I don’t know whether it was prompted by yesterday’s blog post, but late in the day there was a new review put up at Amazon which seemed to specifically address the one-star review. It’s a very positive review, and I would urge you to take a look at it if you get a chance. But this bit in particular caught my eye:
His story combines elements of many popular genres into a near epic tale. It has elements of Sci-fi, mystery, psychological thriller, political thriller, metaphysical enlightenment, alien contact, artificial intelligence, buddy-drama, and action-adventure. I can easily see this world screen-played into an engaging TV series that appeals to a wide range of people.
I’ve joked previously about a possible film treatment of the book, and what that might look like. And I have no reason to think that the TV-meatgrinder would result in anything much better. But I must admit that I find the idea of a TV series or miniseries based on the book to be kinda interesting.
Anyway, thanks to the author for the new review, and if you were prompted by my blog post yesterday that’s cool. Reviews do seem to make a real difference, so if you haven’t taken the time to write a review or rate the book on Amazon, please do.
I hope to get the first travelog from Italy posted later today. But first I have to pay catch-up a bit in my garden.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Failure, Harry Potter, Humor, J. K. Rowling, Predictions, Publishing, Society, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: direct publishing, Harry Potter, humor, Jane Austin, jim downey, JK Rowling, literature, promotion, publishing, writing
While I’m on a bit of vacation, I have decided to re-post some items from the first year of this blog (2007). This item first ran on July 20, 2007.
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How would you like to have been the guy at a publishing house who sent back J. K. Rowling’s query for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (as the book was first titled in Britain)? Purportedly, over a dozen people have this bit of professional shame lurking in their past. There are plenty of other such stories out there of writers who had trouble selling their first book, who then went on to hugely successful writing careers. But given Rowling’s phenomenal success (which I think is fully deserved), this is the tale I find most amusing as I struggle in obscurity with my own writing.
Getting published these days is largely a matter of luck. Oh, if you are already a celebrity, then getting a book published is a simple matter. But as we live in an age of celebrity, I don’t find that in the least bit surprising. But for a first-time novelist, breaking through is really a matter of luck as much as anything.
Don’t believe me? Figure that quality will eventually attract a publisher, the way that J.K. Rowling did after a dozen rejections?
Tell that to David Lassman, the director of the Jane Austen Festival in Bath. Lassman, a frustrated novelist himself, decided to see what would happen if he sent around sample chapters and plot outlines for some of Jane Austen‘s work to British publishers. From The Guardian:
After making only minor changes, he sent off opening chapters and plot synopses to 18 of the UK’s biggest publishers and agents. He was amazed when they all sent the manuscripts back with polite but firm “no-thank-you’s” and almost all failed to spot that he was ripping off one of the world’s most famous literary figures.
Mr Lassman said: “I was staggered. Here is one of the greatest writers that has lived, with her oeuvre securely fixed in the English canon and yet only one recipient recognised them as Austen’s work.”
Lassman barely tweaked some of the names and titles, but left the text largely alone. And so, one of the most celebrated authors in the English language couldn’t get past the first-line readers employed by most publishers and agents to filter out unsolicited submissions.
As I try and psyche myself up for making another round of passes at agents, trying to convince them that having over 3500 people download my novel based almost entirely on word of mouth is an indication that there is indeed some demand there, I will remember this. I do not delude myself into thinking that I am a writer on the same level as Austen or Rowling. Hardly. But not all published work is in anything like that league. Further, the decision as to what gets published, what gets past the poorly paid staff stuck with opening envelops, is largely a matter of just dumb luck rather than the reflection of any sort of quality judgment at all.
Jim Downey
Communion Of Dreams 