Boy, I hate it when I discover something I should have known-or at least suspected.
I’ve had to put a stop-well, sort of-to a lot of my writing, and instead have had to do a boatload of editing. (Dr. Frey, you were right. There is no such thing as good writing, but only good editing.) I’ve been writing the Cosantóirí Chronicles now for the last few years, and I’ve been writing them to average-before editing-roughly 300 pages of single-spaced, 12 point Helvetica font prose. Then I adjust the pitch and font-Georgia, 13 point, space and a half-and each completed book ended up over 400 pages plus. Add to that the glossary in the back, and I thought that was pretty reasonable for a self-published e-book. I mean, I can read about 300 pages in roughly an evening’s time.
Now, in talking with a fellow singer-who’s also writing-he mentioned that his editor wanted him to keep his book to about 100,000 words. So I did some research...and found the same approximate word count for the kind of books I write. On more than one website for writers, prospective writers, and those of us who write for fun. 100,000 words? Really? That didn’t seem like enough to me, but I decided to see what that looked like.
Fionnachtain-my first book-ran 208,000-plus words. Ón Am Atá Thart-the second in the series-ran some 190,000-plus words. An Cailín Órga-the third book-ran 180,000-plus words. As George Takei would say...."Ohhh, Myyyyy.”
I've been writing two books at a clip and didn’t even know it! That means, if these numbers hold up, that I don’t have seven books and an eighth almost completed. It means I have closer to fifteen books written, at that seemingly arbitrary word count, and a sixteenth nearly in the can. And the framework for the seventeenth and eighteenth started.
What writing I’m doing now is filling in some blank spots as I figure out how to split the existing works roughly in half. I’m still telling the story I’ve been given as a gift-it’s just that, now it’s going to be a lot more books than I first envisioned.
The good news is that what is now the first four are once again available. Fionnachtain, Aibíocht, Scéalta Saol, and Ón Am Atá Thart are available. Aibíocht and Scéalta Saol are the volumes that came from what was the excess of the first two volumes. I’ll start editing An Cailín Órga this week in my free time.
Thanks for your patience and understanding!
UPDATE: The first eight volumes are now available. In addition to the ones listed above, An Cailín Órga, Breithe Clan, Oíche Dáta Deasghnátha agus Cosantóirí Saol, and Scéalta na Breithlá Déag are now available. The Cosantóiri Chronicles website is currently being revised to reflect the changes.
If you were on the Cosantóiri Chronicles website, you can return by clicking here.
I decided to take a short break from packing stuff to move, preparing a sermon, grading papers, and writing books (not all at once-I’m not that good at multitasking!) to catch up the blog.
For those who haven’t heard: I have returned to the denominational church of my youth: The United Methodist Church. After joining Ebbert Memorial UMC in Springfield, OR and completing my dissertation, I found I had too much spare time on my hands-and a need to do something with my calling. After a chat with my DS, I was sent as a lay person assigned (even though I hold ordination credentials) to Hope UMC in Drain/Yoncalla, OR as their pastor. Long story short, this past July first I have been sent instead to Pioneer UMC in Coquille, OR. This is a 1/2 time slot; I’m hoping to remain there while I undertake the things I need to do to become a full elder. That's a three year process, so I have some time.
The good news is, there’s a parsonage to live in. This means for the first time in over eight years, most of my books are on shelves-and have been thatched and duplicates pulled and donated to the church for their rummage sale next month. I have an actual office as well, and I have a church with good people who want to see things happen. (Not that the folks at Hope didn’t-they also want to see things grow and get bigger as well. Join me in praying for them and their new pastor, Jerry Steele.) The downside is that we’re in the middle of a move that is having to happen much faster than we’d planned...they want to rent the apartment we’ve been living for five years by the first of August. Geez, I hate moving. Nerves are frayed, money’s tighter as a result for a few weeks-but God is good. (There’s also the part about commuting 2 1/2 hours one way to get there, but I’ll come back to that in a moment.)
Add to that I’m now the interim director for the Cascade Chorus, the Barbershop chorus I have been the assistant director of the last five or six years or so. Toss in doing things like attending Annual Conference and a Pastoral Transition conference...and you find that ol’ Doc Crandall’s been a busy cuss.
Little things one takes for granted-like working internet-are coming together. I spent most of my Monday getting that back up and running; my wireless HP printer was balky and the Airport Express needed to be "persuaded" to play nicely with the new wifi router. I can find things in the kitchen now, and many of the boxes and tubs we’ve hauled down there have either been sorted and their contents found homes...or will be in short order. (Have I mentioned how much I hate moving?) And the fun part is that it’s only half the stuff.
See, Deena-who lost her full-time job the end of June-now has a part time job doing the same stuff with a different department, and some per diem hours as well. If she makes the CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) course she’s trying to get into, she’ll be busier than I am. As a result, she has to stay in the area to work. So we’re moving half our stuff into her folks place and will pay them some rent, and I get to commute that 2.5 hours one way I mentioned earlier.
I want to make one thing profoundly clear: this commute is not a sign of trouble in our marriage. Just the opposite: we are having to work harder on our relationship as we won’t have the time together we’re used to spending. On the other hand, because we are both so busy, the time we do have together is made more special.
So...to my students, I ask your indulgence for about another seven to ten working days; I’m starting to have enough time to grade like I’m used to-which means back papers will get caught up fairly quickly. To my parishioners, I ask your continued grace as I get settled into being your new pastor and find a routine that works. To my chorus, I ask you hang with me a little longer-and keep working on your music at home. And to everyone else...when you think about us, keep us in prayer. Now, more than ever, we need God’s grásta agus síocháin-His grace and peace-to help us through a tough period of time.
This whole article started off with a simple thought. “St. Patrick’s day is coming, and wouldn’t it be fun to find an Irish flag to fly off the patio?” Now you have to understand a few things: One, I do have some Irish roots, and I have proven that to the Irish Government’s satisfaction. A Certificate of Irish Heritage hangs on my office wall to prove it. I’ve already mentioned my trip to Cill Airne agus Corcaigh (Killarney and Cork) in 1997, and the three things we learned about Lá Fhéile Pádraig-St. Patrick’s day-while there. (You can read about that here.) I’ve found that-besides all the obvious silly green paraphernalia-there’s not a small enough flag available locally to fly off our patio. The only one I could find was a 3’ x 5’ job, which might have doubled as a bedspread were I so inclined. The search for this has given me pause, however. (Hence this blog article.)
One other thought comes to mind on how Americans celebrate St. Patrick’s day: it’s smack in the middle of Lent, which means consuming copious amounts of booze is generally frowned upon by the Church as there are some who gave up booze for Lent. I was pleased to find a sober St.Patrick’s Day party in New York; one could only hope that concept takes root elsewhere. (Check out the webpage for it here...after you’re done reading the rest of the blog, if you don’t mind.)
Back to my thought: If this one day is theoretically celebrating all things Irish, you’d think I’d find Irish flags all over the place. Granted, this year there’s a lot more push to market Easter-which is another blog for another time. This year, Easter is early. (Thought: is it proper to consume a chocolate cross at Easter? Should such things even be sold?) In North America, the day certainly doesn’t seem to be much about a sainted Christian, one who has been credited with bringing the Christian faith to Ireland. And after going back through my pictures and digitizing 42 of them to get a feel for that trip once again, I can’t say that I saw too many Irish Princess tiaras, shirts telling people about how much beer they planned to drink, or even men pinching women’s hindquarters if they weren’t wearing green. (And I pity the idiot who tried pinching a woman wearing orange, as there are a few Protestants living outside Northern Ireland. That chap would likely get slugged into the next county.) It’s no longer even a celebration of Irishness, it seems. It appears to be more and more focused on a stereotype the Irish are really starting to fight: the drunk. In fact, I suspect Patrick would be somewhat appalled at how Americans celebrate a day which was meant to honor him, his legacy-and his Christian faith.
So...celebrate as you will, but keep in mind some of what I’ve said. Yes, I’ll be wearing something green that day; what that is will be depending on the weather. As for the flag that I’ve been looking for, the item that inspired all this writing tonight...I found one online, and even with shipping it’s ten bucks. It’s a nice looking cotton job with brass grommets, 12” by 18”. I’ll probably order it before the first of the month. The saddest part is the pole and bracket I’m going to have to get to fly it properly-as well as an American flag when those days to fly Old Glory come-will cost more than the flag will.
Now that’s wrong in and of itself.
Enough for now.
Happy New Year, culture lovers!
For a number of you, you may not know this: I’ve been writing in my spare time. What started off as a short story to get a dream out of my head has blown up into what is now a six book series called The Cosantóirí Chronicles. There are plans and outlines for at least one-and as many as three more-books in the series, guaranteeing I’ll be writing more for at least the next year. The “average” book when I get done is in excess of four hundred pages each, including a glossary; in nearly two years I’ve written six of these. That’s three a year, average.
So you know: These books are not Christian Fiction. These are more Sci-Fi/ Fantasy, where there are moral people. They tend to be the kind of books I like to read-but I’ve said before these aren’t for children or immature teens. I choose to be a Christian that writes-not a Christian Writer-because I truly feel that the storyline I’ve been given is a gift.
Late last month, I quit writing (after completing book six in the series) and did some editing. My supervisor at Master’s-Dr. Dennis Frey-has told me for years on end that “There is no such thing as good writing. There’s only good editing” and he’s right. Boy, is he right. (He’s right a lot by the way, and I don’t say that just because he’s the president of the school I work for.) Part of that editing was to take the time to create both Kindle and iBook editions, instead of just ePub editions, so I could enter both the Kindle Publishing Direct and iBookstore markets.
But after creating three iBooks I’ve chosen to not create any more for now, and to focus instead on Kindle versions. There are several reasons for this, which I’ll explain below. But you need to understand that up front, it wasn’t an easy decision to make. I like the fact that iBooks Author now has a prose-only template. The program itself is easy to use; I can take a completed document and turn it into am iBook in roughly two to three hours. That’s the only upside, however. The negatives are many, at least to me:
1. The interactive nature of an iBook is fantastic. You can click a link and it will take you to a glossary description of that term. That means I have to create and populate the glossary. It’s also what takes better than half the time to create an iBook from a finished document. That takes time away from editing and writing other books in the series. By going with Kindle, it creates a .mobi file in a matter of seconds-and the only downside to it is that the reader will have to turn to the glossary in the back, just like I do when I’m writing and editing.
2. iBooks Author requires you to use an iPad to check the formatting for your book. In addition, it seems that any book you create using the program is only readable on an iPad. That’s great for sales of Apple product...but lousy business for a self-publishing author who does not own an iPad. (Yet.) iBooks is Apple-specific, and while I don’t have an issue with that, there is a marketing issue. There are Kindle programs for iPhone, Mac, and Windows that allow you to read the books you download, which allows for a broader acceptance of the work to be read.
3. The iBookstore requires that each iBook has its own International Standard Book Number-or ISBN-number. That’s not inexpensive; $250 for ten. As I see six completed books-and maybe one to three more-that’s $250 for a bulk assignment. Right now, that’s money I simply don’t have. Kindle Publishing Direct simply assigns an ASIN number (Amazon Standard Identification Number) and is done with it. Of course, if I just want to sell ePub editions on my own, I don’t need either one.
4. Finally, I have to look at what is an easier sale. Not everyone has an iPad, and so just doing a version for that as a self-publishing job is more time and effort than it’s worth. It’s not a matter of being lazy. If I had to start all over again, I’d probably write each volume as an iBook and then export it as an ePub as well. It does become an issue in that it takes away from the rest of my life and the rest of the work I do.
If all I did was write for a living, I’d be all over iBooks Author. I like it; it’s an easy enough program to use. But for me the downside outweighs the positives right now. I may change my mind later on, though, and finish the set out in iBooks. (But only after I get an iPad to check the product out on.)
A final note: another good e-book program is Calibre. It’s available for Windows, Mac OSX, Linux, and as a portable system. They recommend a donation; I do as well. It’s a little clunky-but powerful, and will open all e-books except for iBooks.
Enough for now.
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