On the Grille -- Book Review Three Daves

On Today's Menu -- THREE DAVES by Nicki Elson

Friday's have been such a weird thing for me lately, and I feel badly that I didn't even post last Friday, but all that is about to change. Starting today and for the whole month of October, I will be doing book reviews here at the Piedmont Grille. I have some great guests planned and some surprises and give-aways so make it a point to stop by on Friday's, have a gnosh, and relax.




This first book review is a surprise for Nicki, because I didn't tell her, or even ask her if I could do one. I won a copy of THREE DAVES sometime at the beginning of the summer, and finally had time to read it out by the pool.

For anyone who wants a trip down memory lane to the 80's, this book is for you.

Sprinkled with euphemisms, music, fashion of the era, and a few well-placed Jane Austenisms, THREE DAVES is a good-time blast from the past with a romantic twist at the end that even I didn't see coming.

Nicki Elson takes us on a journey when rites of passage for girls were plagued with doubt, guilt, and Madonna hair. We follow the main character, Jennifer, through four years of college and three very different men named Dave.

Jennifer Whitney thinks she's the last American virgin in 1986, and embarks on a quest to rectify the situation without looking like a slut (her word). She meets David, (#1) a friend of a friend, who turns into her friend and then becomes her first sexual encounter.

Somehow along the way, Jen's tastes in music change as well as her taste in men. Enter Dave (#2) a beautiful bad boy, who's only thought is his next score (be it sex, drugs, or punk rock 'n roll).

Hastily dumping him when she realizes he's not the "Dave" for her, she meets Big D (#3) at a frat party. Big D is like a dream come true -- star athlete, 4.0 GPA, from the right side of the river -- "D" appears to be everything Jen's ever wanted.

Until Jen has an accident and all three Dave's show their true colors.

This book was so much fun, and it took me back to a past I thought I wanted to forget. Okay, Kajagoogoo anyone?

If you want a trip back to the 80's, this book is for you!

Available on Amazon.

E-Publishing Under Your Own Name or Having a Company

Today I'd like to talk about a decision I made when I decided to e-publish. Now, most of you know Anne Gallagher is not my real name. For those of you who didn't know that, sorry. It's not something I talk about for very personal reasons. I decided a long time ago that I would build my "platform" if you will, on the name Anne Gallagher. I like that name, and has been in my family for several generations.

Having said all that, when I decided to self-publish, I went to the Kindle help pages whereupon I found out I had to provide my "publishers" information. WHO is publishing this book. I am one of those persnickety people who gets all weirded out by seeing a name on a cover and then reading the title page and finding out the two names don't match, I feel cheated. (I know I'm just weird.)

Having also decided to go with the automatic deposit, I had to have a bank account in that name. And because Anne Gallagher is not a real person, (well she is, if you Google her, there are about 10,000 of them in this country alone) I didn't want my money going to anyone else but me.

So I decided to publish under a company name. Shore Road Publishing. It's where I used to live. (see picture above) I really wanted Beach House Publishing because that was the name of my old catering company (Beach House Casual Catering) I wanted the same thing. But Beach House Publishing is already taken. So, can't. And variations on that theme also came up with someone else using it.

In having found a new name, I then decided to file that in the Register of Deeds office so no one else could use it in my county. It's for tax purposes. I wanted to keep my business separate from my real life. (If you decide to file one, I suggest Sole Proprietor.)

Hence the next step was in going to the bank and opening up a simple business account. Because I also have my checking account there, it was free. And like I said, SIMPLE. I just wanted the account for automatic deposit. If somewhere down the road it looks like I'll need to add more to it, I always have the option.

And because I am the sole proprietor of the business, I do not need a tax I.D. number, I can use my own SSN. Which is nice, one less thing I have to keep track of.

I also opened up a PO Box under the name of Shore Road Publishing so I can get mail there.

Now most people who self-publish aren't so anal when it comes to deciding HOW they're going to publish. They just use their own name and SSN, hit Save and Publish and be done with it. I'm going to tell you why I didn't do it that way.

The Monster Child.

As a single mother pushing 50, I have to think about her future. The best thing about self-publishing to Kindle is the "long tail". Meaning, these books will remain "in print" until I decide to take them down. There will never be just a single print run, there will never be 'no returns' to the publishing house (at least I hope not), they will always be there floating around in cyber space. Which means, hopefully, they will always be generating royalties.

Having made the decision to start my own "publishing company", somewhere down the road, I will incorporate and make The Monster a partner, the CEO of that company. So when I die, it will be hers. And she can do whatever she wants to do with it. The "long tail" if you will. Either keep it or not. I won't care, I'll be dead. And if she ever wanted to pursue a writing career, she could also publish under Shore Road Publishing.

So that's what I did, and why I did it. (This, of course is the simplified version.) Now, for some of you, this may not be the way to go. Only you and your accountant can decide what's best for your future, but in having set this up now, it's one less thing I have to worry about later.

If you decide to go with a company name, rather than your own name, here are the three easy steps.

1) File your company name with the Register of Deeds in your county (or town or city hall, states vary) If you are the Sole Proprietor, you do not need a tax I.D. number and can use your own SSN. Most Small Business Administration offices will have the one page paperwork, or town or city hall. Mine cost $14- to file it.

2) Open up a business bank account under the company name. (Again, you don't need a tax I.D. number, your SSN will be fine.) Like I said, mine was free because I also have my checking account there. I deposited $10- into the account just so it would have something in it.

3) Post Office Box is a really handy thing to have as well. For six months it costs $27-. They'll send you a reminder when you have to re-up.

So for $51- dollars, I have my own company again. I also don't have to worry about Amazon sending my money to someone who isn't me. I don't have to worry about the post office losing my mail. And I don't have to worry about The Monster's future. For now.

Tell me -- Have you thought about doing this? Even if you're going the regular publishing route? Do you like to keep your writing life and real life separate?

Men In Love

Good Morning My Darlings. One of the greatest joys of being a writer is that I get to make stuff up. Go into my own little world and create characters, people if you will, put them in situations and see what they do, how they react. My favorite part of being a writer is creating a man who falls in love. I know how women do it, I am a woman, (last time I checked) and we're so e-mo-tion-al. Googly, giggly, giddy, starry-eyed, e-mo-tion-al wrecks. (Okay I'll admit, yes I am.) We primp, we preen, we wonder, we talk, we discuss, we lament with our girlfriends and an-a-lyze every single thing he says and does.

I must have read 10,000 romances over the course of my lifetime. Mainly historical. And all of them have had strong, macho heroes. They react to their situation instead of analyzing everything to death. Only when they realize they're going to lose the girl do they generally start thinking about what the problem is.

Which I think is why romance is the biggest selling genre. Men are men, women love them, even when they do stupid things. Men don't really show their emotional side and we know that about them. However, in reading romance, the author does tend to do that, and we eat it up like candy. What women do you know right now has said these words, "Oh I wish my husband, boyfriend, significant other, would just open up to me and tell me what he's feeling."

I must say, in my own stories I'm guilty of the same thing. My heroes go off all stalker and stomp around hitting things, when all they really want to do is cry. Only until they realize they're absolutely going to lose the woman of their dreams do they TELL her what's what.

Tell me -- Have you ever read a book where the man TELLS the woman how he's feeling, first, before he flies off the handle and beats things up? Do you think, we, as female writers can really get into the heads of men and show their emotional side, or are we second guessing ourselves?

Apologies to any men reading this. Please by all means jump in and discuss.

Adverbs

I've been wracking my brain for a week to try and come up with a post for today. Actually I have 4 right now in draft mode, all waiting to make the cut. But someone said something to me the other day and it's been nagging at my craw so I thought I'd talk about it.

I'd asked a writer friend to take a look at the final proof for THE LADY'S FATE for me. Make sure everything was looking good. I thought I had written a pretty tight story, cleaned up all the typo's and punctuation and what not. Had all the details in all the right places. Was/am pretty proud of the way it turned out. So this reading was just kind of for my piece of mind.

Now this writer, an excellent "working" writer, gave me some pretty fantastic feedback, of which I was glad. She confirmed all my expectations that it wasn't a piece of doo-da, and even though it won't win a Pulitzer, expelled my doubts that I do indeed write a pretty good story.

BUT, she did say I had to watch my adverbs. I have too many -ly words. However, as she wasn't an avid reader of the historical romance genre, she didn't know if that was the style in which they were written.

And I've been thinking about this a lot. Do I really use too many adverbs, -ly words in my manuscript? And the resounding answer is yes. I do. And I'll tell you why.

I like them. They serve a purpose for me. Don't get me wrong, I mean they're not everywhere , but they are there.

For example -- He quickly bounded up the stairs. Okay, he's bounding, so we know what that means. You can only be bounding one way, and that is quickly, so we don't need to say quickly. Hence, delete quickly.

However, I also have -- She answered brightly. Can you see the expression on her face? I could have written -- She answered with a bright smile. But that's just way too long and brightly does the job in one word instead of four. To me, this is an either or choice. I choose brightly.

Now these are just examples, but you get my drift.

The other reason I use them, is because most readers aren't writers. They don't analyze every single sentence structure for mistakes. They're just reading a book, trying to escape their everyday lives. I mean, that's why I read. To escape.

There was a big hoo-hah a couple of years ago about Dan Brown and his writing style. Writers were dissing him, saying he writes like a hack. Well, you know what, I read Dan Brown on vacation and I thought he was a pretty good writer. You know why, because I was reading as a reader, not a writer. The story sucked me in and kept me reading (until the wee hours one night.) I wasn't analyzing his content, I was swept away with his words. I was in Paris, in Spain, on a plane, on a boat. I was trying to figure out who dunnit, right along with Robert Langdon.

Now I couldn't tell you how many adverbs he used, and quite frankly, I don't care. I just liked his book.

With the Big 6 crumbling, and authors and writers using more and more places to get their work seen and read, yeah, sure, some of it is going to suck. I mean, you have to KNOW the rules, before you break them, and we all don't have agents as gatekeepers. BUT, if you have a great plotline, engaging characters, and keep the pace moving forward, I don't think readers will care if you use a couple of adverbs.

And that's what it's all about really. Isn't it? Keeping the reader reading. So they will say, "Hey, I read this fantastic book the other day, you should read it."

Tell me -- How do you feel about adverbs? What rules do you break? Are there any you would like to break, but just can't because of the way you were taught to write?
(Maybe someday I'll tell you about my aversion to semi-colons.)

Returning to Broken Love

Good Morning Everyone. I hope you had an enjoyable weekend. Please note, this is an unusually long post today. I have a lot of ground to cover.

So, today's topic is Returning to Broken Love. You might ask what Broken Love means -- I'm talking about getting back together with someone who's broken your heart. Devastated you.

I don't do it. Ever. Have never. Will never.

There's something about the physicality of a broken heart. Now I know that when someone breaks it, it doesn't really fall apart, but it sure does feel like it. And I'm not talking about high school broken hearts, I'm talking about real true adult broken hearts. (And I've never been married, so I can't speak for what happens in a divorce. This is from a single woman's point of view.)

When you think you've found the "one". You are giddy and in love and everyday is Heaven on earth, there is no other person in the world who means as much to you ever. There is the promise of something "more", of a lifetime together, perhaps. There are years invested, and friends and family, vacations, commitments.

And then, he does something so inconceivable that you just can't believe it. He breaks your heart.

Let me tell you about Richard. We were incredibly in love. He was a chef, I was a restaurant manager, we started dating and somewhere around the two year mark we built and opened a restaurant together, almost from the ground up. I helped with everything, from ordering to hiring, cooking, waitressing, building, picking out tile, redecorating. You name it, he cleared everything through me before he made the final decision. We had our first opening night and invited 100 of our closest friends and clients. It was magical. Things couldn't have been better.

We had our second opening night for the community at large. I was there already greeting guests, serving drinks, when he walked in with another woman. A woman I knew from town. A woman I had no idea he had been seeing on the side, while I had been slaving away helping him with the restaurant.

I literally heard my heart snap in half. After the initial shock, and the dead silence of having the customers watch me to see what I would do, (because it was a small town and everyone knew us as a couple) I walked out of the bar right then and never looked back. Sure he called, and tried to explain, and cried and begged me to come back, but I refused to even take his call. Two months later, the gossip killed him and he lost the business.

I was bereft for about 6 months. Really. I lost almost 30 pounds. I refused to see my friends. I was totally humiliated. I cried ALL the time. I lost a part of myself that I couldn't get back. I swore I would never fall in love again.

Cut to Nevada 10 years later. I started a relationship with Terrence, but I never let my heart get completely involved. I was very leery of the whole "love" thing. But then he was accused of a crime he didn't commit and he asked me to stand by his side, to support him. So I did. Our relationship changed after that. (I knew he didn't do it, and the judge ruled he didn't do it. It was a set-up.)

Sitting in a diner, having a turkey sandwich with my best friend, I realized I was in love with him. I denied it, of course, because I wasn't ever going to be in love again. But there it was. So I committed to him and the love. To make a long story short, 3 months later he told me he was in love with someone else. My best friend.

Yeah.

But she wasn't in love with him. They tried dating, it didn't last 6 months, and she married another guy. Of course he came begging back to me and I turned him on his ear.

The reason I'm discussing this topic today, is that my ex, Monster Child's father, has come back to North Carolina. I'm not going to get into the where-for's and why's about our break-up, it's just too ugly. But it did get me wondering why I won't get back with him.

People change, absolutely, and he has, for the most part, done a complete 180 from where it was that broke us up. But, throughout the last 8 years, he's broken my heart more times than I can count. I gave him chance after chance, because I did love him with all my heart and he is my daughter's father and I thought a family should really try.

The last two years without him around have been hard on The Monster. She loved her Daddy, and now he's back, she's over the moon. And I never wanted to take her away from him, but he was just so damned toxic. He was killing both of us, the three of us, so I made him go.

But now he's gotten his shit together and I'm happy for him. I like the fact he can come over to my house and we can have a civil conversation instead of screaming, or crying or throwing things. I have made peace with my ex. I have to get along with him, he is my daughter's father. I have forgiven him (for the most part) of all the things he's done to me. But I will never forgive him for breaking my heart.

He's asked, The Monster has begged, why he can't move back in. Why we can't be a real family again. How do I explain to my 6 yr. old about broken hearts. About losing trust and hearing lies and the damage it causes.

Once my heart is broken, it takes a long time to heal. And mine has so many scars on it right now, it's held together with super glue and duct tape. Now, I'm not saying I wouldn't fall in love ever again. That's a whole other blog post. What I'm saying is, I won't attempt to rekindle a dead fire. I won't ever get back together with a man who's broken my heart.

Tell me -- How about you? Would you, or have you, gotten back together with someone who broke your heart in a major way? Or is once it's over, it's over?

Brunch at the Piedmont Grille

On Today's Menu -- Belgian French Toast, Peach & Blueberry Tart, Scrambled Eggs with Chives, Cream Cheese & Crispy Bacon, Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice, and Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream (Don't knock ice cream for breakfast until you try it.)




I don't know if I mentioned I would do Brunch on my new list of things for the restaurant or not. But I think it's warranted. I have some things to tell you.

I'm sorry I haven't been around the last few days. More to come on that later.

Also, very sorry about the missing link on Wednesday for the Step-by-Step Guide Mac did up for Amazon. I tried to fix it throughout the day, but it didn't work. Let me try it again right now and see what happens. If you go here, you'll find it. And if this doesn't work, well....I'll think of something.

And hey, thanks to all my new followers. I really appreciate you coming by and adding to the fun and madness here at Piedmont Writer.

Now, as most of you know, I decided some time ago that I would publish THE LADY'S FATE to Kindle in September. I thought when I announced last spring it would give me enough time to work through all the things I needed to work through, and then, boom, there it would be.

Okay, so I kind of put it off for awhile. Well, that's not true. I read the Kindle Help pages. I went to a couple of blogs and got some more information. I wrote up a post on formatting. I thought once I got the information in my brain it would make uploading all that much easier. You know, read the directions twice, THEN put the bike together.

Yeah, no, it doesn't work like that. I read directions until my eyes bled. I worked on formatting scrap manuscripts until they were all so crazy I had to completely delete ALL the formatting and start again from scratch. I have so many screaming emails in my inbox back and forth to Bridget who was walking me through the steps, I sometimes wonder why she remained my friend.

Let me tell you right now, if you have the money to have someone format your manuscript, spend it. I realize I gave the impression that it was kind of simple, but let me share with you from the deepest reaches of my heart, it's not. Not in any way shape or form. Not unless you really know how to click your buttons, find your drop down boxes, read directions in tech speak, and know how not to crash. And I haven't even gotten to the MobiPocket Creator yet.

Formatting a manuscript for Kindle is NOT easy. Not by a long stretch. It's difficult, it's time consuming, it's frustrating (especially when you don't know what the hay-zoo you're doing) and it causes pounding blinding headaches. Bridget offered time and again to do the formatting for me, and you know what, I refused.

Why not, you may ask, if she knows how to do it and I so obviously don't. Because I got it in my head that I would do it. Someone told me awhile ago, they thought it was too hard for me and that it would be so much easier for me to pay someone to do it. Well, you can't tell this east coast, type -A personality, Irish, Taurean she can't do something.

And so I'm still in formatting mode. Yup, formatting the manuscript mode. And I haven't even gotten to the Table of Contents yet. (Oh yeah, did I mention you need to make one of those, and not the easy kind that you just write, but you have to link to your formatting. No? Sorry, I'll get to that next week I think.)

Anyhow, this is just a friendly little piece of advice -- if you've got the cash, and a perfect manuscript, go for it. Upload to Kindle. If not, make sure you invest heavily in Tylenol, have a great friend to help you when you think you're having a heart attack, and have more patience than you ever thought you had.

I'm sure I'll laugh about all this when I actually see the book up for sale, but right now, no, I'm not laughing.

I promise to be in a better mood next week.

Have a great weekend!

How to Format for Kindle Part II

Last week I set about to show you How To Format Your Manuscript for Kindle and Agents. I talked about the right formatting tricks on your computer to get your manuscript in professional order. This week, I'm giving you links. (Because quite frankly the task is so daunting I couldn't do it.)

Here is a link for a checklist posted by April L. Hamilton on what you need to do for uploading to Kindle.

Also, my friend and Primary Reader, J.Bridget Chicoine, has also posted two important posts on formatting, and I would like to highlight those as well. Anything that makes writing easier should be looked at.

The first post shows you, with simple step by step instructions, ways to improve how you navigate through your manuscript. In revisions I'm sure you'd all love to be able to find just exactly what you're looking for without going through tons of notes written on scrap paper (like I do).

The second post shows how you can format your scene headers, which then allows them to automatically appear in the correct order. (And let me tell you how many Chapter Fourteens I had for one manuscript.) **** This is a godsend, I suggest you memorize this, as at some point you will need to use this tool when you have to upload a hyperlinked table of contents.

Hope you take a moment and give these links a look- see.