This novel is special so I decided that I'd dedicate my first novel to all that helped me. Right at the top, I included my mother, who always thought I had a novel in me somewhere. From now on, I'll put my reviewers on the Acknowledgement page.
I've uploaded the whole shebang to Amazon and they say it will take up to 72 hours for it to appear on their sales pages.
I'm SO excited.
Bill
In my novel, I was taken to task by reviewers that I did not use enough contractions. Trouble was, the Japanese language does not have any words for contractions. Oh, in general speech there may be, but when speaking formally -- none. As a result of the reviews, I added contractions to make the story flow better. I didn't even attempt to use proper Japanese construction of English sentences. For instance, the adjectives come before the verb. Ex: "We had a nice meal." In Japanese, you'd say: oyshi shojuji o shimashta (literally Nice meal o did). And that's a simple phrase.
You do what you have to.
Bill
I made only a suggestion or two on the cover, so there's no need to include me. That is, if you were thinking of it. Which probably you weren't. I go shut up now.
LOL. No problem at all. The actual novel was posted long ago.
Bill
Everything has been done now for publishing You Only Love Twice except the dedication page.
I'd love to include as many of those who reviewed the novel and left such wonderful reviews and encouragement. It's been a long haul, but when I finish this page, I'll get it on Amazon.
I have a list of those that assisted, but I'd like to use real names instead of pen names (unless you'd prefer your pen name) in the dedication. Please PM me (or post here if you wish) the name you'd like me to use. Answer as soon as you can so I can go to press (so to speak).
Thanks to everyone. It's been a long road, but now I'm here at the end.
Bill
In my Japanese novel, the first time any dialogue appeared, I mentioned they were speaking Japanese. Then I used English with scattered phrases of Japanese in italics. In spots where they shifted back and forth between the two languages, I had to use the tag you mentioned, but I used it sparingly. It can be done, Dirk. You have to be careful not to overwhelm anyone with "he said in Japanese" tags.
As a secondary thought, if you self-publish through Kindle/Amazon, keep in mind that not all languages (and fonts for those languages) are supported.
Bill
The new editing software I purchased (ProWritingAid) has a tool button that scans for "Dialogue" and reports ALL dialogue tags it finds -- even those not involved directly with the dialogue. By that I mean something similar to the following:
I looked at her and smiled. "That should keep you for a while."
or
My eyebrows rose in surprise. "You're what?"
My software will flag "smiled" and "rose" as a tag even though its a tag once removed. This is quite helpful when returning to chapters written months ago before I bought the software. I'm amazed at how many times my characters have "smiled", "growled", "chuckled" and "yelled" a line. I find ways to set up the dialogue with action and then attach the line.
However, there are times I leave the line alone, as written. If it has impact, or my attempt to work the tag into an action before or after the line, doesn't work/fit, then I don't mess with it. It's all relative.
Bill
Just a quick note (which will probably cost me $10). We are enjoying ourselves so much we might be out longer than we thought. Loads of things to see and do at [undisclosed location]. I apologize for not reviewing, but this is way too much fun.
Bill
Starting next Sunday (Sept 10), I will be out of the office for approximately 14 days. I will have my laptop with me, but intend on spending my time exploring and taking tours, not online. In fact, if I have to pay for wireless, I might not even boot it up. This means that I will have all those reviews to do when I get back. I will get to them, but it might take a while.
Cheerio,
Bill
In my Japanese novel, I had an even bigger problem -- vertical characters. For the usual phrases in Japanese, I converted the characters with diacritical marks into their English equivalent (barred O into OO, etc). For others, I did like KDot did, made a JPG image of the letters, scaled them properly to the same as Time New Roman at 14-point, and inserted them into the text once I pasted the chapter into the tNBW editor.
It worked well.
Bill
Too late to modify my last post so I'll just add that I do immediately edit any suggestions/corrections on the current chapter, but I don't post it again until the entire novel is finished.
Bill
Hi, Pat and welcome to TNBW. How you handle your stories is pretty much up to you.
If you're like me, I like a complete run-through my entire story before I go back, edit, and repost anything. Others will do as you first suggest, posting a chapter, edit, and post the same chapter. I tried that when I was new, but I found that I posted the same chapter three times before moving on. Each time I posted the chapter, I received ideas that I wanted to meld into my story. If I hadn't moved on, I would have remained on that first chapter for a long time.
Bill
For those who receive the generic "New posting from connection", and you use Thunderbird for your email client, there is a wonderful add-on named "Edit Email Subject".
When you get a notification email, and you don't want (or can't) to take care of it right away, you can hit the "E" key and enter text that will replace the email Subject line. So if, for instance, you get the generic notification, you see who it is and replace the subject with an actual name. If you have several (or sometimes in my case, many) emails lined up, you can tell immediately who they are for. An added advantage is if you give the same name, you can sort on subject and have all by the same author grouped together.
Bill
Two months ago, I had 1200 points, but then started posting two novels. I'm down to 840 or so.
Bill
I know of what you speak, Dags. I've found a few of mine also. Most of them from so far back I failed to remember what they referred to. Some were on a forum that doesn't exist any more. Go figure.
As for erasing everything you've ever Google-searched, it is possible. You have to go to your Google settings and follow paths down, but you eventually can find the button that says "Erase all past search terms". Click that and you effectively start again after making Google forget everything you've searched for in the past. There is another check box you can set that says "Never remember searches". if you check that, Google won't remember anything you searched for -- thus it can't give you any targeted ads.
Bill
I've been on Booksie longer than I have been here. I published a lot of my novels and short stories there first. Some are still there, some aren't. The members of Booksie tend to be younger, at least from what I've noticed. Of course, at 75, younger is relative. You get different reviews there than you get here. There is no point system, so no motivation to give lengthy reviews. I get a lot of "Good chapter." entries. Just recently, Sol added the capability for inline commenting.
Bill
Dags:
I read everything that David Drake writes. In his RCN series books with Captain Leary. The foreword usually makes reference to wars that took place way in the past, such as the Peloponnesian Wars or the constant strife between Troy and all comers. His spacefaring books reflect these conflicts, only take place in the far future. He's changed all the names, but if you read into his novels you can see the give and take of the original war, only now it is between planets.
So, as Rachael says, you could eliminate everything but the basic plot - and only mention Grand Hotel as being the inspiration.
Bill
Well, shoot. All we did was go to the commissary on base and spend $200. Then we went to Krogers and I bought sushi.
The woodpeckers and sawyers are happily at work next door hammering and sawing lumber for the new house. Really sorry to see that big lot now with a house on it. It's been noting but grass and three wonderfully cooling trees for 25 years. I can't imagine anyone wanting to build a house where they have to spud in a well for water. The nearest sewer is way across the back yards on an easement so I bet that cost them a lot as well. My wife is going to miss the afternoon sun flowing into her workroom now that a house is going to block it.
Loved the donkey tales. My granddad kept donkeys on his farm for plow use. They were the most stubborn animals I'd ever come across.
Bill
I'm a relative newby, having joined in November of 2014. But I'm fairly sure that the year of beta-testing the new site started in 2013. I joined Sol's sister site, Booksie, in January of 2012. My first postings were utter crap. I've learned so much here. I've made some solid friends and for that I'm thankful.
Bill
A lot of dogs, all over the country, and other pets as well are going to have eye damage if their [they're] outside during the solar eclipse. Their curiosity will likely make them look at the partial eclipse, and even one glimpse at the sun will result in permanent damage.
Bill
Sometimes your writing stinks[,] and there's no easy way for me to say it. Saying nothing at all might be "nicer" but...
Your writing stinks. ....
Shazaam!!!
One should never - ever - click on an unfamiliar or random link on any page. Most sites will not use pop-up dialog boxes because most browsers should block them. I didn't get the CYCO pop-up but my browser (Firefox) gave me a "Firefox has blocked a popup on this page" alert.
But, it's gone now anyway.
Bill
Pretty decent idea, Mike.
Bill
I have a sign on my wall. It reads:
"I've gone to find myself. if I get back before I return, keep me here."
Bill
Thanks, Rhiannon. I can't imagine how I would manage a time travel novel. The paradoxes (paradoxii?) would drive me insane. Well, not actually drive, it would be a short putt.
I am finding bug after bug in the desktop editor/writing software I bought from ProWritingAid. It seems like every day I am bitten by yet another hole in their programming. I wouldn't mind it so much except I've been programming for over 50 years and it really grinds my gears to see such terrible programming. I am pretty sure that when my year is up, I won't be renewing.
The latest bug was a doozy. I spotted it today. If I edit in their desktop editor and replace, say, one word with three words, it looks good in the editor window, but when I save the file, all three words are run together. I can almost hear the editor shrugging it's shoulders and saying: "Hey, what you typed replaced that word didn't it?"
Bill
I read some of them also. And didn't find a one I'd buy. A couple I might read, but not buy. Maybe it is because of the seeming glut of publishers nowadays. I can't believe I've submitted to 50 of them. With the advent of "the Cloud", anyone with a couple of computers to rub together can form a publishing house.
Bill
