E-Books

I made my first short story E-books, this one: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/170120 costs $.99, this one: when-your-dog-is-a-bird, is free. Please make some comments at the respective sites. I need the motivation to help me finish my numerous stories in progress. Thanks.

Rejection

I noticed I haven't posted for a while, and noticed I haven't posted about the book for quite a while.

I decided to try going mainstream by sending letters off to literary agents. I am happy to report that I got some rejections in the mail today. Let me explain that statement. I sent some query letters by e-mail, and some by snail mail. The people who wanted snail mail said to include a SASE, so I did. But, because I never got any back, I was starting to wonder if I didn't understand the whole thing. It's all good, I got several today, as well as an e-mail from someone who was interested.

The whole rejection thing is very interesting, most of the letters/e-mails are polite, but some of them are really very well written. I would like the good writers to be my agent, because I look for an extraordinary response just like they look for an extraordinary query letter.
About 1/3 of the agents from "Big Book of Agents" did not meet MY minimum qualifications, such as a functional website, or a proper e-mail address. Look Mr. Agent, I own my own domain name, why do you get your mail at Hotmail? I think not. Some of them had websites that were expired. Seriously? Why would I trust you, then.

It's too soon to tell what the future holds, what's awesome is that I have nothing to lose, I can always continue to sell my book myself.

Pay no attention to the Man Behind the Curtain

In a discussion involving Internet Presence, I realized I had more than one identity. I have never cared much whether people could find me, know who I was, or for that matter what they thought of me. So now you all know, here's my picture, whether you know me as "onebadbug", Steve Ward, E. Normus Johnson, or just the author of The Gearheads Cookbook.

Book Signing Event

I'm having my first book signing event at Little Italy, the wine and beer place about a block from my house. Yeah, it's also a gas station. That's where I buy my race gas.
December 3rd, from 4 to 6. Why should you come? Because there will be free beer and wine tastings!

http://statelineplaza.com/littleItalys.html

Amazon

It's alive!

My book

French Toast

It will definitely be a while until the book is released now. I made a tactical error in thinking my local publisher/printer would be making my book. It turns out, they don’t want to because “they don’t do cookbooks”. Really, you want to print books by local authors with a local interest, but you still want to put restrictions on what kind of book it is.

So, now I have to learn all about the publishing industry, which is one of those obtuse, quirky professions not based on logic or common sense. Yeah, that ought to be right up my alley.

Some of these guys will only take submissions by e-mail, some absolutely not by e-mail. Some won’t accept submissions at all, you must have an agent first. Most won’t do a cookbook, only typical fiction type works, but I found a few who do. One is a place run by 2 lovely white haired ladies, I don’t think they will get it.
You find the phrase "enough torque to pull the panties off a nun" offensive?
Sorry.
One place requires a minimum of 200 recipes in a cookbook. Really? Mine has half that, and by the time you do all those, you can cook anything. One place is selling a book that is all about French Toast. An entire book about French Toast. Are you freeking kidding me? Here’s all you need to know about French Toast:

Get a shallow bowl, mix up a couple eggs and a little bit of milk in the bowl. Get some regular white bread, preferably a little older and dried out. Toss it in the bowl, and coat both sides with egg mixture. Throw it in a frying pan with some oil, and cook until done, about 3 minutes per side.

Done, 60 words, why would anyone buy an entire book about French Toast?