Promoting

Pre-Halloween to Present…

It has been a busy time since just before Halloween, and continues on now, but I was able to get Episode One of my horror series Night Dreams, done. E1-The Beginning, takes Dr. Joseph Rickettes back in time to when he discovered his gift, and how it changed his life forever. The novella finished at just shy of 25,000 words.

After I was satisfied with the story, and after three drafts and editing, the formatting began for all of the various retailers, I was able to get the eBook in Amazon’s Kindle store by my self-imposed deadline of Halloween. Barnes & Noble’s Nook soon followed, with all of the other e-reading platforms soon to follow.

This was my first attempt at using Scrivener for the writing. With it being new to me, I made the most of it by using all of the needed functions to get the story done. There is a lot more to discover with the program, but I plan to continue using it alongside Microsoft Word for my future works. The conversion to mobi, epub, pdf…etc worked well for me, and as I get to know Scrivener more, I’m sure I will find more of the helpful features it has.

In all, the Night Dreams project was fun, and I find that setting those deadlines helps to keep you moving along in those times when you may not feel the writing-vibe hitting you. Episode Two – Andrea’s Demons, coming soon.

Hope your writing and reading are going well.

~ALJ~

Night Dreams Cover Unveil

I have completed the first story (episode 1) of my horror series Night Dreams. It checks in at over 22,000 words before editing, which is taking place right now. Episode 1 is titled The Beginning, and details how it all started for Dream Psychologist Dr. Joseph Rickettes. I hope to have it available in eBook format by Halloween.

Here is a synopsis:  Serialized fiction that follows a Dream Psychologist, Dr, Joseph Rickettes, who has no choice but to live out the nightmares of his patients in hopes of curing them of their demons. He is bound by the demons in their dreams, while he struggles to make sense of the nightmares that plague his own life.

I am working on Episode 2, yet to be titled, and plan on having that out soon.

I will be unveiling the cover art for the horror novella Floor Four within the next couple of weeks.

Update and A New Look

It’s been awhile since I last ‘blogged’, which may make it look as if I haven’t been very busy. Even Twitter has suffered in the last couple of months. Aside from work and everyday life’s needs keeping me busy, I have been working on a couple of different projects (along with the change of the look and feel of this site), that I hope to have done and out to the masses by Halloween, (we will see if that works out the way I hope).

I am working on three different writing projects personally, and I am also working with Kathryn Stelher, who is finishing her first romance novel Time Doesn’t Wait, to be published under the  Ace-Hil-Ink brand. I’m not one for reading romance stories, but I do look forward to reading and helping with editing her final product. She plans on releasing it this December.

Of the projects that I am working on, the one that is taking a majority of my time is my Serialized Fiction Series Night Dreams. – A Dream-Psychologist takes in patients who are having horrific nightmares that feel so real and dangerous that they seek help in a psychologist who specializes in extreme nightmares. Dr. Rickettes has a talent, skill, or curse that helps him rid them of their nightmares –  I plan for each episode to be in the short story/novella range of 15,000 to 20,000 words. The first one, yet to be sub-titled is already in the 13,000-word neighborhood.

I am also working on finishing my novella Floor Four. This story was released in my book, Purgatory-13 Tales of the Macabre, last October. The abrupt ending, (no spoilers here), is what I am working on, to be released as a stand-alone story. It is by far the longest of the 13 stories in Purgatory and was originally planned to be its own novella. But as I was in the middle of writing it last year, I decided to put it in the book as a teaser. Again, I hope to have this out by Halloween.

My third project is a shift in genre. It is a baseball story that I am dedicating to my father. He taught me everything i know about the great sport.  I have no deadline on this one as I am taking my time to take in all of the accounts of my personal experiences. It will be  fiction with a lot of real life experiences mixed in.

That’s the update. I plan on posting more often. I hope your writing, reading, or whatever keeps you busy is going well!
(I also hope you like the new look of the website)

~ALJ~

Purgatory Giveaway Winners!

Congratulations to the 4 winners of Purgatory – 13 Tales of the Macabre. The contest ran for 3 weeks and ended on May 7th at midnight. First of all, I want to thank everyone who followed, left a reply, comment or re-tweeted one of my posts on Twitter. As I try to get this new blog off to a good start I hope to connect with others through here and any other social network we can.

Now on to the winners. After taking in the entries, I used random.org to choose the 4 winners, with follows and re-tweets on Twitter gaining an entrant an extra chance. The winners: Fellow bloggers – JK Bradley – Armand Rosamilia – Natasha Hanova and Twitter follower – @promotehorror

I will be contacting the winners and getting their copies to them.

Again, thank you to everyone who showed interest. I look forward to reading your blogs and interacting with you.

Purgatory Book Trailer

Book Giveaway

PurgatoryTo help celebrate my new blog and get it off to a good start, I am giving away 4 signed paperback copies of Purgatory – 13Tales of the Macabre. To find out more about it, and read the synopsis, hit the Fiction tab above.

To enter the contest you must 1) currently be a follower of this blog or sign up to follow and 2) leave a comment with your email to contact you if you are a winner. Another way to double your odds is to follow on Twitter @acehilink and retweet one of my posts there about the giveaway.

The winners will be selected on May 7th at 11:59 pm pacific time.

We will use random.org for selecting our winners. Good Luck!

The Making of a Book Trailer

The making of book trailers is nothing new in the writing community. It has become more trendy and fashionable in the past couple of years as a very important promotional tool for authors with upcoming books and novels. It seems that each year technology advances in every aspect of our lives, and with computers and readily available software from many different sources, making a video, and in this case, a book trailer is a much more pleasant and easier experience.

As I began to write my first book, I was aware of the concept of book trailers and how they played a role in marketing. But as I got over halfway done I realized that if I was planning on making one, it needed to be done prior to release. That’s when the reality of it hit me. It wasn’t so much about the book trailer in whole, but more about its place as part of the marketing tool as a whole. Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads are all part of the social networking world. Creating a website and or blog is probably the most important part of the promotional process. The book trailer is a different animal altogether.

There are many places to promote and show your video, with YouTube being the biggest and most popular. For my book, Purgatory I actually made two trailers. I made a pre-launch video using free software available on YouTube’s website. It didn’t take me long at all with their simple tools, and after adding a couple of my own images I had it up and running. I was surprised at how easy it was to get something that I now consider critical, on the web and available worldwide. After I had it up on YouTube I was easily able to embed it to my website. The process was almost seamless and gave me the “trailer” fix I needed until I had time to work on the official version.

By now I was almost done with my book and had my website up and running, along with all of my social media. As I was doing my final editing and getting feedback from beta readers, I began working on, what I call the official trailer. For this I used Windows Movie Maker. (I prefer the older version over the newer one.) A little info on Purgatory; it is a collection of 13 horror stories and I wanted a picture to go with each story. Sort of like its own book cover. For some of those images I purchased the royalty rights through websites that made those available. But for a few, I went to the actual sites where the inspiration for the stories took place. Most of the stories in my book are real places with my own twist on what might happen in a dark horrific way. Along with that I drove down the actual Evergreen Road, one of the stories in my book and shot video, which I then incorporated into my trailer.

Making the trailer itself took some patience and a bit of hard work but it was one of the more pleasurable experiences in my whole making of the book journey. In the end, the book trailer came out very well for someone on a self-publisher’s budget. I uploaded it to my YouTube channel at the end of last year and then embedded it to my website.

Has my book trailer created any sales for my book? Maybe, maybe not. But as I see it, no pun intended, it is another form of creativity, much like writing a book. If that form of creativeness can be seen by the reading masses or the general public, then it is yet another way to express your creative ideas and product. I hope to see your book trailer soon! ~ALJ~