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Book Sales
All three of my books are currently in the top 100,000 of Kindle book sales at the moment. Since there are over 6 million titles according to Amazon, that mean all are in the top 2% in sales as of today. Sweet! đ
Top Five Movies
I was just asked my top five movies. At the moment, I would say they are (in no particular order)…
O Brother Where Art Thou
Vertigo
Titanic
Itâs a Wonderful Life
Brokeback Mountain
Voice(s).
Blogging Challenge Topic Today: Do you write like you talk? Blogging is inherently personal and therefore leaves a lot of room for your unique voice. How do you show your reader your personality through your writing?
“The blogging challenge lady asked WHAT?!” came the reply from one of the voices in my head.
“She wants to know if I write like I talk!” said the second voice.
“Like you talk to who?” questioned Voice 1. “Yourself? Or normal people?”
“She didn’t really specify!” Voice 2 responded. “I guess that’s up to us… but she did say it could be our unique voice…”
“Which of our unique voices?”
“I don’t think that she was necessarily considering the fact that some of us might have more than one. She also asked how we show our readers our personality through our writing.”
“Which personality?”
“Again. I think we’re relatively unusual in that we have more than one. We’re probably a little crazy or something.”
“Hmm… well that makes things kinda confusing!”
“Yeah. Doesn’t it, though?”
“Why don’t we show our readers both of our voices?”
“Both? But what if they’re freaked out?!” Voice 2 said in alarm.
Voice 1 shrugged. “Then they’ve got no sense of humor, I suppose.”
“At least not our kind of sense of humor,” Voice 2 suggested diplomatically.
“Well, our sense of humor is the only one worth…”
“DON’T you dare finish that horrible sentiment!” Voice 2 interrupted in a stern tone. “You’re going to make us sound completely conceited! And we’re not! Not at all!”
“Fine!” Voice 1 grumbled. “But I think we should show them our internal dialog. It might be fun! Sure would make for a heck of a blog…”
Voice 2 considered, putting its metaphorical finger to its metaphorical lips. “Okay. Deal. We’ll give it a try.”
Voice 1 pranced around HikerAngel’s head in a victory lap. Voice 2 simply smiled and shook her head at the antics of her less mature half.
Voice Acting Notes
I put together some voice acting character notes for Control‘s voice actor. They don’t really give any more away than the Amazon summary blurb, so I figured I’d post them here. Some of you might be as interested as I am in how this narration process for Audible and iTunes goes…
Control – Character Notes
One thing that I struggle with sometimes as a reader is keeping track of whoâs who when there are a number of characters at the start of the story. I normally donât start a story with a large number of characters for that reason, but in this case, it was a necessity given the story concept.
To help the reader keep track of the characters, I attempted to make each girlâs personality match her ability, so that it works narratively as well as helps the reader keep track of who is who.
For voice acting, the five main girls will probably need to be fairly easily distinguishable. Hopefully, their dialog helps with that–itâs pretty distinctive for Kana, Quina, and Helen, though Tara and Maria are less distinctive. Maybe having more drastically different voices for those two characters would be good?
If you think that textual changes to the story would help make it work better for voice, Iâm completely open to that. Itâs fairly easy to sync the Kindle version with updates, so feel free to let me know if something doesnât work.
Character Outline
Major Characters (All are high school seniors)
Kana (pronounced Kah-nah)
Primary protagonist and anti-hero of the story
Half-Japanese
Mousy in appearance
Fierce, calculating, and cold in personality
Desires control over anything and everything – the ultimate control freak
Extremely intelligent
Raised by a single father who drives her extremely hard academically
Plots to steal the othersâ powers once she realizes that they have them
Quina (pronounced Queen-uh)
Well rounded academically, socially, and athletically
White
Has both parents, well-balanced home life
Soccer player
Popular and respected among peers
Class president
Activist-type
Receives the quantum/spacetime-bending powers
Helen
Computer geek/techie/hacker type
Korean American
Hipster in appearance
Loves to use hip/irreverent slang
Closet lesbian, has an unrequited crush on her friend Quina
Gains the cyber ability to control technology with her mind
Tara (Tare-uh)
Outdoorsy hiker-type
Native American
Dies her hair red (to distinguish from other dark-haired characters/allows reference by color)
Gushes over environmentalist causes nonstop
Slightly vain, a trait magnified when she receives her ability
Gains the biological ability
Maria
Homebody who likes arts, crafts, cooking, family
Latina
Mothers the others
Always complains about being cold
Gains atomic/elemental control ability
Damien (Dame-ee-en)
Indistinct, a cipher for the storyâs primary target demographic (males age 18-39)
Black
Athletic/handsome
Football player
Minor Characters
Amanda
Bitchy head cheerleader character trope (for efficiency, word conservation, reader âgetsâ her immediately)
Blonde, attractive
Only purpose is to help complete Kana character arc
Kanaâs Father
Hard driving
Wants to push his daughter to be successful but has pushes too hard and turned her into a sociopath
Only purpose is to show how Kana became who she is
Positives
Today’s Blogging Challenge Topic: Write about something positive. What is something good thatâs happened in your world recently? Share a smile, share a laugh, share a success.
As I wrote in my poem the other day, some positives have come from this whole virus mess. For me, personally, I’ve been having FaceTime conference video calls with my sister, mom, and dad. The quality is sometimes wonky (probably because there is such heavy use of technology bandwidth right now), but it has been working.
I’ve spoken more frequently with my family and more distant friends since this whole thing started than I have in years. It has actually brought us far closer together than at any point since I left home for good at eighteen. I’ve even simul-watched a movie with my sister, using instant messaging to chat about it as we go.
Thank goodness for technology! Without it, this whole thing would be so much worse than it isâŚ
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Great Movies!
I watched Lion earlier this week on IMDBtv, and rented Jojo Rabbit tonight. Lion brought me to tears, and both had me in stitches and pulled at my heart strings.
I loved them both! đ
Spirit Symbiote – Part 1
Part 1 of my new sci-fi superheroine action tale is available now on my site. It will be hitting superwomenmania.com soon as well… đ
Phoenix
Tailpipes vomit putrid carbon.
Too essential for planet’s salvation?
Hmm. Perhaps not.
Fastfood clogs bulging bodies.
No time to cook?
Hmm. Perhaps not.
World fractures, cultures clash.
Common experience impossible?
Hmm. Perhaps not.
Hate to walk, to run, build fitness.
Exercise today’s drag, never highlight?
Hmm. Perhaps not.
Routine too engrained for change.
Inevitable death by thousand cuts?
Hmm. Perhaps not.
Guiding hand flips world on end,
adjusting perspective,
lighting crucial dawn,
gifting realization
of true importance.
Life.
Hmm. Perhaps.
Stats
My site really grew in viewership in February and March, and I have decent view counts for a personal blogging site now when I look at the last 30 days. In total, I’ve had 18,783 views from 3,049 visitors. Not too bad for a blog I started in mid-January.
The United States is still my largest audience, but the UK passed Germany for second. Still, other than Canada, which is #4, the rest of the top ten are all from the European Union.
When I look at what draws people, it’s mostly my stories, not blog posts… surprise, surprise… đ
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