Tag: Writing

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Koyocon – The Convention Madness Continues!

So… I haven’t really been to a convention in a while, have I? I mean, it’s been two months since the last one!

It feels like I just got home from Genki, but now I find myself packing up books to go to Koyocon. Luckily it’s only an hour drive this time!

Koyocon is a small Danish convention which will be held for the first time this year. I’m not sure how much there will be to see since it’s just starting out, but as it’s close to home I’ll take my chances. Not to mention, I know quite a few people behind the project, so I thought I would be supportive!

The convention runs from 8.-10. November and I will have a table all Saturday in the Artist Alley. As per usual, I will be selling books and posters, so you have the chance to bring home a shiny copy of Resounding Echo or Silent Sound.

Oh well… I got packing to do!

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The Joys of Hidden Formatting

Nothing like having friends point out when you messed up. Isn’t it wonderful to get a message from a friend currently reading your book with a copied excerpt looking like this:

“So the illusion broke,llided itt lunged for her.ng the enormous, flaming creature. clearly again. when you attacked Nadesha?” She asked slowly.”

Excerpt From: Louring, Michelle. “Resounding Echo.” Michelle Louring. iBooks. This material may be protected by copyright.

Of course the first reaction I had was to frantically look through all the different copies of the manuscript on my hard drive, hoping that the mutatilated sentence above was the result of Smashwords’ brutal Meatgrinder software. But alas, to my horror I located the same paragraph in the Kindle file I prepared by myself.

But strangely, it wasn’t to be found in my original Word document.

Word Formatting

That is, until I pressed the formatting symbol…

Formatting Error2

Isn’t it nice to know that your writing software is hiding terrible secrets from you? And even nicer that those secrets only get exposed when you decide to upload the document for the world to see!

…I really have no idea how this happened. But I do know that this error is probably in every single ebook version of Resounding Echo available at the moment.

I can only console myself with the fact that hidden formatting doesn’t show up in printed books!

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Going on BookLikes(Giveaway)

I have been quiet since Genki, but I’m far from dead and buried!

…Well, I’m getting buried in work, but I’m still alive down here. I’ll dig myself out at some point.

If you have followed all the drama over at Goodreads,  you might have noticed people fleeing to other sites like LibraryThing and BookLikes. Though I was never the biggest user of Goodreads, I decided to give BookLikes a try in the hope of them creating a better platform.

So far I already like it better than Goodreads, mostly because it’s simpler. There’s not thousands of groups and forums with each their own set of rules, but instead each user get their own Tumblr-like page that they can use as they please. It doesn’t seem like there is as much opportunity for creating as dysfunctional a community as the one that formed on Goodreads. I really hope I’m right in that assessment.

Giveaway

To get a better feel of the community, I decided to try out BookLikes’ Giveaway feature. I’ll be giving away 15 ebook copies of Resounding Echo and all you have to do is to join here if you have a BookLikes account. There’s no other terms, even though a review on BookLikes would be deeply appreciated!

Join the Giveaway here or visit my BookLikes page here.

booklikes

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Genki, Night Elves and Defenestration

Genki Artist Alley

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It’s Sunday and Genki has come and gone. I’m dead tired, but as usual I had a great time participating in Artist Alley, even if my friends managed to get me covered in super glue. Again. Seriously, guys!

I’ve been to quite a few of these conventions by now, three times as an author promoting my books, and I have got to know a lot of new people, so I met many familiar faces and made even more friends this time around. I was there with my friends Simone and Nina, both of whom are way better at promoting me than I am. Simone is the born saleswoman and if you don’t believe me, take a look at the post I’ll be putting up later.

Apparently, everybody is better at selling books than I am… Earlier today, a random guy came around my table and started promoting my books to passerbys. His only request was that I threw someone out a window in my next book. How could I say no?

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Since it was a J-Pop convention, there was a lot of focus on costumes as well. Simone is a great cosplayer (see her Facebook page Skymone Cosplay) and she was wearing her Night Elf(World of Warcraft) costume during Saturday. However, she had some technical difficulties and apparently, my table was the best place to fix various broken armour items. Hence the super glue episode…

She looked great, though, and people was falling over themselves to take pictures of her. Check out the picture post to see some of the great shots!

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All in all, I had a great weekend and even though I long to relax, I can’t really wait to sort through some of the pictures so I can post them here!

If you were at Genki, please throw me a comment on this post! Did you come and chat with me or do you have a funny convention story you want to share? Don’t be shy!

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Genki, Here I come!

Genki Con

Watch out people, I’m going in!

I’ll be leaving for Genki later today and I’m already quite sure that I’ll be forgetting something. Oh well, it’s not like the convention is on the other side of the country or something…

…Wait. It is! Let’s see, tickets, books, bullwhip… *Continues rummaging through her bags*

Anyway… As I wrote in my earlier post, you will be able to find me in Artist Alley most of the weekend. I’ll be selling paperbacks and posters, and I’ll love to chat with people if they come by! A lot of people came to talk to me during SVScon and I really enjoyed it. And only like half of them talked to me only because I had a spare chair at my table. Whee!

Unfortunately, I didn’t get to finish my costume, so I’ll stick out like a sore thumb in my regular clothes. Maybe I’ll put on a Halloween mask and scare children…

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Are you going to Genki? Then remember to throw me a message or send me pictures afterwards if you talk to me at some point!