Filed under: Amazon, Art, Augmented Reality, Comics, Connections, Humor, Kindle, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, augmented reality, blogging, Communion of Dreams, Danielle Corsetto, Darnell Sidwell, direct publishing, Girls With Slingshots, humor, jim downey, Kindle, promotion, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, technology, Tweet, Twitter, writing
Lots of fictional characters have Twitter accounts — usually, one created by a fan to have a little fun. Well, the idea* occurred to me today to set up an account for Darnell Sidwell, who is the main character of St. Cybi’s Well.
If you’ve read Communion of Dreams (and if you haven’t, why not? I mean, seriously, go read the damned thing.) you know Darnell as the crusty old prospector with a colorful history. St. Cybi’s Well is the start of his story (OK, not really — he’s already middle-aged — but for our purposes it is), and you get to meet a man who is 40 years younger with a lot of changes ahead of him. Personally, I love the character, even if I’m going to put him through hell in this book.
Anyway. St. Cybi’s Well is not being written from Darnell’s perspective. Rather, like Communion of Dreams, it is written from a third-person narrator’s perspective.
But the Tweets are going to come directly from Darnell, from his perspective. He’ll be writing about his thoughts and experiences as the story of St. Cybi’s Well unfolds. Sometimes there will be hints about the story. Sometimes he’ll give away some insights. Sometimes he’ll (unintentionally) mislead, because he won’t understand exactly what is going on in the bigger picture.
This will be fun — and somewhat useful for me, since it is always a good thing for a writer to completely get inside the head of a character, to understand how they view the world. To a certain degree I go through this exercise with any major character, but this will be a way I can share some of that process. When all is said and done, it will form something of a supplement to the novel, and I’ll probably figure out a way to have those Tweets collected/linked in the final version. In the meantime, you can ‘follow’ him @DarnellSidwell, and we’ll put up batches of Tweets on the St. Cybi’s Well site. He’ll probably Tweet every day or two, as my schedule allows.
Now I need to get back to work. Toodles!
Jim Downey
*Credit where it is due: this idea came to me when reading today’s Girls With Slingshots strip — note the ‘hover text’.
Filed under: Feedback, Health, Predictions, Publishing, Science Fiction, tech, Travel, Writing stuff | Tags: blogging, direct publishing, jim downey, predictions, Science Fiction, Scrivener, St. Cybi's Well, technology, travel, Wales, writing
I haven’t been doing a lot of blogging the last couple of weeks. Partially, that was due to my having actually come down with the actual flu — and getting that shortly after I had finally gotten rid of the last vestiges of the previous illness really sorta sucked my energy level down.
But there was another reason: I’ve been writing St. Cybi’s Well.
Well, kinda. Kinda-sorta.
See, I’m using Scrivener. Which I like a lot, but which is completely different from my previous work habits in writing a book. In an odd way, it’s more comprehensive, more systematic. I’m still learning how to use it, and it is taking some fumbling around and a bit of mental re-organization to get the hang of it. But rather than just having an outline and building one chapter after another, I find I’ve been constructing a framework and then working on individual scenes scattered through different chapters. By the time I finish with St. Cybi’s Well I’ll really understand how to use these tools efficiently, and hopefully that will mean more books, sooner, after this one. We’ll see.
Anyway.
I hope to have some solid things to share in a month or so. But in the meantime, I would invite you to browse my 2003 and 2006 travelogues of trips to Wales. You’ll get a pretty good glimpse into the locations and descriptive language for St. Cybi’s Well, since I am basing a lot of the book on those very real experiences. Consider it something of a sneak preview, just because you read the blog.
And thanks for that, by the way. It’s good to know I’m not just talking to myself here.
Cheers.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Art, Astronomy, NASA, Predictions, Science, Science Fiction, Space, tech, YouTube | Tags: art, Communion of Dreams, jim downey, laser, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, Mona Lisa, Moon, NASA, predictions, science, Science Fiction, space, technology, video, www youtube
I don’t want to reveal any spoilers, but here’s a passage from Chapter 15 of Communion of Dreams:
The moment the projector was set down and turned on, Jon could see what had them all so excited. There were flashes of light coming from the image of the ship, clearly directed back at the ASA.
“It’s brilliant. They’re using the point-defense lasers designed for clearing away debris in their path as strobes, to communicate with us,” said Gish.
Gregor nodded. “Yes, yes. Simple digital message, as fast as lasers can be switched on and off. Not designed for communications,so cannot transmit as much data as normal. But pretty good.”
Why do I mention this? Well, guess what’s just been done by NASA? Take a look:
Here’s an excerpt from the associated article:
NASA has turned the Mona Lisa into the first digital image to be transmitted via laser beam from Earth to a spacecraft in lunar orbit, nearly 240,000 miles away, thanks to a technology that may soon become routine.
The experiment took advantage of the laser-tracking system that’s in operation aboard NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been circling the moon for the past three and a half years. NASA sends regular laser pulses from the Next Generation Satellite Ranging station at Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland to the space probe’s Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter, or LOLA, to measure its precise position in lunar orbit.
I love to see my predictions come true.
Jim Downey
With thanks to Wendy for sending me the article!
Filed under: Apollo program, Astronomy, Connections, ISS, Man Conquers Space, NASA, Predictions, Preparedness, Science, Science Fiction, Space, Survival, tech | Tags: Apollo, blogging, ISS, jim downey, NASA, predictions, science, Science Fiction, space, video
It all depends on your point-of-view:
Jim Downey
Filed under: Art, Book Conservation, tech | Tags: blogging, book conservation, bookbinding, jim downey
I love what I do professionally. Seriously, if I hit the (figurative, since I don’t actually play) lottery tomorrow and never had to work again, I would still spend part of my time doing book conservation work, probably as just donation for various under-funded state & local organization who need such work done.
Nonetheless, there comes a point in any project where you’re just glad to be done with it. A couple hours ago I delivered work to a client, including the 1470 legal text I have written about previously. I thought I’d show the end result.
When we last checked in, I said that the book was ready for a cover – one made with fake “cords”. Well, here’s the process of making such a cover:
Prepping the high-density bookboard – using a wood rasp to bevel the edges, which was typical for books of this era.
Goatskin leather. Heavy grain, wonderfully strong and lovely, processed using archival dyes and tanning salts. This skin cost about $200.
Leather cut to size.
I thought I took some pics of the process of mounting the boards and fake cords to the leather, and then the cover to the text block. Guess not. But it is not fundamentally different from the images to be found here.
Here’s the cover, finished and mounted to the text block:
And here it is with the new spine label (calfskin, gold foil) mounted:
Remember, this is how it came to me:
As it came to me. Note the 1960s-era spine added to a 1880-era cover.
Big difference, eh?
Jim Downey
Oh, PS: Forgot to mention it yesterday, but I chatted with the librarian at the institution about this book. To the best of his knowledge, there are only about 100 known copies of this book still in existence. One in good condition is probably worth between $50,000 and $100,000.
Filed under: Amazon, Art, Connections, Jeff Bezos, Kindle, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, anniversary, art, blogging, bookbinding, Boxing Day, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, free, Jeff Bezos, jim downey, Kindle, literature, Merry Christmas, promotion, reviews, Science Fiction, self-publishing, technology, writing
Happy Boxing Day! Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas, filled with love & friendship.
Yesterday was also a “Promotional Day” for the Kindle editions of Communion of Dreams and Her Final Year, and both books saw a decent amount of traffic for a holiday. More on HFY later — right now I want to chat a bit about Communion.
As it happens, yesterday was also the 11 month ‘anniversary’ for the paperback edition of Communion of Dreams — the Kindle edition came out a few days earlier, but January 25th is what I consider to be the ‘launch date’ for the book.
And in 11 months, there have been a grand total of 23,216 downloads of the Kindle edition of the book, sales of 25 paperback copies through Amazon, and something about twice that of paperback sales through me directly (including the Kickstarter copies). Of the total downloads, a bit less than 7% were sales/loans, totaling 1,507. Meaning that I gave away some 21,709 copies of the book.
Selling 1,500 copies of a first novel really isn’t too bad, to be honest, and that would have been about what was expected through a conventional publisher in the past for an unknown writer. And to be quite honest, I’ve earned more from doing this than I would have through a conventional publisher — the ill-fated Publisher Who Shall Not Be Named offered me an advance which was about one-third of what I have made on the book so far. It’s not a lot of money, but it is nice to be rewarded for all our hard work — thanks, one and all.
And “moving” 23,000 copies of the book all-told? That’s downright respectable. In the previous 5 years when I had the earlier .pdf version of the book available on my website, there were a total of about 35,000 downloads. That right there shows you to power of Amazon’s system and Jeff Bezos’ vision.
I will again offer free a “Promotional Day” next month — probably in conjunction with the first anniversary. But don’t let that dissuade you from going ahead and buying a copy of the Kindle edition, the paperback, or even the hand-bound hard-cover — remember, you’re helping to support good independent writing and art!
Again, happy holidays, everyone!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Connections, Failure, Feedback, Flu, Health, Kindle, Marketing, NPR, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, tech | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Christmas, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, free, health, jim downey, Kindle, literature, NPR, promotion, publishing, Science Fiction, self-publishing, Simon & Schuster, technology
I’ve been sick with the current nasty version of cold/flu going around, so I missed writing about this:
They used to call it the “vanity press,” and the phrase itself spoke volumes. Self-published authors were considered not good enough to get a real publishing contract. They had to pay to see their book in print. But with the advent of e-books, self-publishing has exploded, and a handful of writers have had huge best-sellers.
True, of course, but the piece is also about how the ‘traditional’ publishing houses are now trying to get in on the self-publishing market:
There have been more and more self-publishing successes recently, and the audiences are growing by leaps and bounds, says Carolyn Reidy. She’s the CEO of Simon & Schuster, which recently announced that it’s launching a new self-publishing service. If traditional publishers want to survive, Reidy says, they have to keep up with the rapid changes taking place in the industry. The growth of self-publishing is one of them.
“We actually understand that it is a different world than what we do,” she says. “We want to understand it, and if it is going to … be a threat to our business, we definitely want to understand it and also see how we can turn that to our advantage. And one of the advantages is, it is a great way to find authors, also new genres and new audiences.”
Because I’ve been sick, perhaps, my attitude is “screw ’em.” Yes, I would like to have my books readily available in brick & mortar stores. And realistically, that’s only practical through a traditional publishing house.
But as I have said and documented here for almost six years now, traditional publishing is broken. The major publishers were too inflexible in the face of changing technology, and entirely too insular & inbred in how they sought out new authors. If you were famous or had a connection inside the industry, you had a chance of getting noticed, otherwise it was nothing but a lottery with little or no regard for quality.
I certainly haven’t hit the big time with self-publishing. And I have had to work a lot harder at promotion. But I am *very* happy with how it has gone, and I really appreciate all the help I have gotten from my readers. Thanks, everyone!
And to that end, let’s do a “free download” day for Christmas: The Kindle edition of Communion of Dreams will be free to download all day. So if you don’t have the book, get it! And if you know someone who you think might enjoy it, tell them about the promotion!
Merry Christmas!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Predictions, Science, Science Fiction, tech | Tags: blogging, CNN, Communion of Dreams, Hyperstealth, jim downey, News, predictions, science, Science Fiction, stealth, technology, video
This is starting to get some attention:
A Canadian company called Hyperstealth is reporting that it has developed Quantum Stealth, a material that renders the target “completely invisible by bending light waves around the target.” If the mock-up photos are to be believed, Quantum Stealth basically works like Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak.
Since 2002, Hyperstealth has been in the business of designing camouflage patterns for military uniforms, vehicles, and installations. In 2010, at the International Camouflage Symposium, Hyperstealth’s CEO Guy Cramer demonstrated SmartCamo — a material that could reportedly adjust its camouflage markings to match its surroundings. We say “reportedly” because Cramer apparently published a video demonstration of SmartCamo, but then US military intervened and asked him to take it down. Presumably Quantum Stealth is a follow-up from SmartCamo.
Again, for security reasons, Cramer is saying very little about Quantum Stealth. All of the pictures that you see here, and on Hyperstealth’s site, are mock-ups, because “for security issues we can not show the actual technology.” Cramer says that both the US and Canadian military have seen Quantum Stealth in action, and that they’ve also confirmed that the material obscures the target from infrared (thermal) imaging. Below, you can see Cramer talking to CNN’s Pentagon correspondent about Quantum Stealth.
In addition to the cited CNN video, there’s another news item from a paper which seems to be local to the company. In that article Cramer has more to say:
“That’s the thing that surprises most of the people at these meetings, that it works as well as we’re showing there. It only takes a few seconds for someone in these meetings to verify, yeah it obviously works for the visual spectrum.”
The invisibility cloak also conceals ultra-violet and infra-red heat rays.
“It actually masks the entire thermal signature from the user.”
Cramer added, “We’ve proven it, but I’m not about to show it because there’s no need to show you what works because the only people who need to see this are the people we have shown.”
Uh-huh. He has a magic, er, make that “quantum technology” cloak, but doesn’t want to show anyone outside of the military, even though he’s perfectly happy to discuss how great it is.
Is my skepticism showing? Or has that been masked by quantum effects?
OK, so he’s shown it to the military. Wouldn’t just about any special forces organization in the world literally kill for such technology? Here’s what one such officer said, again from the Maple Ridge News article:
Maj. Doug MacNair, with Canadian Special Operations Forces Command, confirmed that Cramer made a presentation to special operations within the last few years.
But there’s been no decision to follow through.
“We didn’t pursue it further, at least not at this time anyway.
“It wasn’t something we were interested in pursuing at the time. It doesn’t mean we wouldn’t in the future, necessarily. “We’re aware of the company, we have the information. But we don’t have a contract in place at the time.”
Maybe Mr. Cramer is asking too much money for his technology. Or perhaps this is some kind of ruse on the part of the military, to make it seem like the technology ain’t that big a deal. Because the clever thing to do is to promote this all over the web, and then deny that it is something that any government would want. That way no one will pay attention to it. Right?
Er, right.
Don’t get me wrong — I think such technology is possible, and I use something very like it in Communion of Dreams. This is from Chapter 18:
Jon walked to the edge of the pool. He heard a noise behind him, turned slowly to look at it.
From beside a large bush a pile of boulders shifted. The air shimmied, light danced, and a crouching figure emerged, covered in a fabric drape that tried to keep up with the changing surroundings. One hand pulled the drape to the side. Another was holding a very
large sidearm.
But that’s 40 years in the future. I don’t think that this is a tech which has come to be real quite so soon.
Jim Downey
And damn if it doesn’t work, too.
And yeah, I’m old enough to remember systems like this.
Jim Downey
Communion Of Dreams 