101 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Temple Wang wrote:
Charles_F_Bell wrote:
dagny wrote:

Thanks, Suin! smile

Perhaps you can answer the question on how an editor who claims to have a bunch of global clients is qualified to do what he claims to do. He provides no name  - only a reference to having a connection to the Irish and Canadian publishing markets, a fact irrelevant to an American author looking to write for Americans and perhaps publish in the U.S.A. Presumably he can expect aspiring authors submitting to the free site for busine$$ through clearly referenced Irish website editorial.ie, and no editor's job is to make a work publishable for any reason other than the mechanics of good writing  such as the right and proper spelling the word, "colour" as "color."

His email is:  editor@editorial.ie
If you are really so curious, why don’t you just ask him directly?

Skepticism requires interest in the story of the buyer and not the seller. So we have five or so potential buyers so keen on the product of the seller, though it be ostensibly free, but no statements of their reasons.  Furthermore, on the Irish website not giving out free samples, there are the "testimonials", a red flag in the eye of the skeptic.

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102 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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dagny wrote:

Thanks, Suin! smile

Perhaps you can answer the question on how an editor who claims to have a bunch of global clients is qualified to do what he claims to do. He provides no name  - only a reference to having a connection to the Irish and Canadian publishing markets, a fact irrelevant to an American author looking to write for Americans and perhaps publish in the U.S.A. Presumably he can expect aspiring authors submitting to the free site for busine$$ through clearly referenced Irish website editorial.ie, and no editor's job is to make a work publishable for any reason other than the mechanics of good writing  such as the right and proper spelling the word, "colour" as "color."

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103 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Dirk B. wrote:

I'm wondering if folks can tell me what they do as far as acknowledgements of websites from which they uncovered useful information to include in their stories but didn't lift the text word for word from the source. I've been researching for a year for my new WIP and have visited hundreds of websites, most of which were useless. The number of useful sources is probably in the dozens, some of which provided as little as two or three sentences of new information. I had originally planned to acknowledge the ones.I use all the time, like Wikipedia and Catholic.com, but I haven't been tracking the others. I've also read about two dozens books and made detailed notes, and I watched many videos and photos on Googl,, resulting in more notes. Most of this stuff was educational to me but would be common knowledge to Catholics, so some of it appears on multiple Christian/Catholic websites.

Is there a best practice for how to acknowledge sources for a fictional tale?

In my opinion no such acknowledgements for the creation of a fictional work is necessary. In fact, I doubt that you can lift words directly with or without acknowledgement, so don't. Some publishers provide a copyright and/or acknowledgement page that may include other sourcing material, but if you check Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, you see that will include nothing of the volumes of material he read but only of helpful persons. I would say if you were to acknowledge Wikipedia as a source, that might prove embarrassing.

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104 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Mariana Reuter wrote:

Suin:

This is excellent, Suin! Thanks for sharing. I read several of his comments on other people's work and they make a lot of sense.

Rah, rah, sis-boom-bah!

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105 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Suin wrote:

Hi everyone,

Is anyone else struggling with the opening lines of their novel? Or putting off querying agents or self-publishing because they're just not sure they've got the first chapter right yet?

I recently got a free review on my first 1k words from a professional editor which was extremely helpful. He critically analyses your 1st chapter and comments from an agent's perspective on the overall storyline, adds some copy-edits, and finally gives it a grade of gold/silver/rejected/etc.

I'm sharing this because I found it really useful and hope some of you find it useful too. Here's his website; http://theopeninglines.com

Yes, and thank you for that, but is there any objective standard by which one can judge his opinions having any value? For example, gold star and heaps of praise for the opening to Forlorn Hope House that begins with paragraph after paragraph of deep POV of a worldly female airhead because (we are assuming) deep POV of a worldy female airhead sells because (we assume) there are enough female airheads, perhaps worldly, perhaps not, in the marketplace who can identify -- or doing whatever they do -- when they buy such books.

"The psychic distance between your main character and the reader should remain pretty constant, in order to maintain a consistent and seamless reader-immersion in the narrative." Okay. Need he say more? Well, yes.

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106 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Kdot wrote:

Not exactly equivalent.

1. Everyone should visit the Rockton Fair this summer. The fair offers unique attractions.
2. The Canadian National Exhibition occurs annually. The Exhibition attracts a worldwide audience

In (2) the Caps is optional. Anyone living in the shadow of this event knows you're proper-naming it the moment you write that. Someone living in England not so much, and may wonder why the caps was used.

Brits can't spell ;-)

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107 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Dirk B. wrote:

Here's an example from a capitalization article about geographic naming: Everyone should visit the Indiana Dunes. The dunes offer hiking, swimming, and picnicking. If I follow my Guard rule, then dunes should be Dunes.

I disagree that is correct. However, " ... Indiana Dunes. These dunes offer hiking..."  is correct because there is a shift in logic of a specific geographic species "Indiana Dunes"  to a generality of "dunes" in which the species "Indiana Dunes" is included.  The difference between the definite article the and the adjective this/these indicates this difference.

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108 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Dirk B. wrote:

I was going to go with lowercase sea, but I have a similar example that may complicate things. In my previous book, I had a large military force named the Praetorian Guard that protected the Imperial Family. Based on examples from other writers, when I shortened it, I kept caps: "The Guard stands with you, Imperator." as opposed to "The guard stands with you, Imperator."

Thoughts?

I agree. Just as the Guard refers to the Praetorian Guard, the Sea (in context) refers the the Sea of Galilee.

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109 Topic by Charles_F_Bell

(0 replies, posted in Literary Fiction)

Okay, so it has been a year since I posted in this forum I moderate. I have not been absent from TNBW as so much neglectful of this hobby.

However, I do not expect this forum to be an echo chamber of what I think regarding the greater topic, Literary Fiction, so I prefer members to post, and I react/reply/advise (or not).

The particular bee still buzzing in my noggin is about dialogue without attribution by dialogue tags but by other means --- mainly by style-logic of alternation and inherent character of the dialogue itself. I intended to have written a story wholly in this style but ... it has been a year,  I will get to it shortly (or not).

Certainly how wonderful and entertaining and educating and informative that any member has something to say about the only genre worth the word "serious"* in English-language culture - that is to say, without the restraint of genre to reach for a higher purpose in meaning and entertainment.   

*serious - 1. (of a subject, state, or activity) demanding careful consideration or application.

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110 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Dirk B. wrote:

I'm including the Holy Land's "Sea of Galilee" in my WIP. When I refer to it simply as sea (e.g., Low hills lay beyond the sea/Sea.), do I capitalize sea? It's a specific sea, so I'm inclined to capitalize it.

Under what circumstance would you refer to it as simply "sea"?  If you didn't want to repeat "Sea of Galilee" but want to say, for example, "In the Galilee close to the Sea" you would capitalize it. Even if you wrote: "He went down to the beaches along Tiberias and took a dip in the Sea," you would capitalize it. I cannot off hand think of an instance where you would not.  Maybe: "At Tiberias he found the sea quite warm," if the reader is already familiar with the location and that "sea" is the "Sea of Galilee."

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111 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Bevin Wallace wrote:
Charles_F_Bell wrote:

a boy, who as an autistic sociopath, cannot know what he has done.

I started to reply, “How would you know?” And then it dawned on me...

News reports of his interactions with Florida government social services

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112 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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And may I say further that those who wish to overturn the ongoing Revolution against slavery that is America, that you cannot succeed, and emigration to those slave societies, islamic and socialist or the merely corrupt kleptocracies of Africa and Asia -- the s***holes of the world -- so admired and defended by the Left, is an option at any time.

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113 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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John Hamler wrote:

In light of, but not to make light of,  the latest mass shooting in Florida...

Real world policy is a different animal. If "access" is how we define "liberty" then how do we, as "liberal/irreligious" Americans, discuss gun control without dismissing or disenfranchising those who cling to the Second Amendment as if it were American Gospel?

The Second Amendment, among several critical aspects of the Revolution against despotism the American Left wishes to reimpose, is American Gospel in literal and figurative manner.

There is a difference between lions and asses, and he is a fool who knows not that swords were given to men that none might be slaves. - Discourses Concerning Government, Algernon Sidney

The dead and injured at Douglas HS in Parkland, Florida are wholly victims from a corrupt and dysfunctional government in state and local up to the federal, the schools, the mental health governance, and not from a boy, who as an autistic sociopath, cannot know what he has done. Who should be punished and corrected (notwithstanding the malfeasance and perhaps the criminal actions of the "adoptive" family for the boy) ought to be the state school administration, the local police and FBI.

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114 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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I guess there is wisdom in the advice of not feeding the political-sociopathic trolls.  You even get a more partisan puppet (Renato Mariotti) to speak the Trump paranoid delusion, although in form it is merely a pastiche of Democrat talking points in defense of Obama-era corrupt government.

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115 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Memphis Trace wrote:
Charles_F_Bell wrote:

Why do you persist in making this a forum for Trump paranoia?  It's one thing when politics or such-like detaches from  discussion started about something related to writing or literature, but your behavior is sociopathic.

¿Posting a critical analysis from The New York Times of a much ballyhooed propaganda memorandum attacking the FBI and the judicial system is not about writing and the kind of critical thinking journalists need to employ to write their opinions?

You must not be a journalist if you think posting the work of Pullitzer Prize winning columnists on a writing site is sociopathic. If you aren't interested in journalism, watch Fox News.

Memphis Trace

Were you to have ever posted a critical analysis from ... any source in comparison to NYT/WaPo/MSNBC ... then instruction might have followed as to how "journalists" like discredited economist Paul Krugman and the craven neoconservative Bret Stephens can be compared to dispassionate fact-rendering real journalists like ... a typical high-school newspaper reporter there might be in any U.S. town.

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116 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Why do you persist in making this a forum for Trump paranoia?  It's one thing when politics or such-like detaches from  discussion started about something related to writing or literature, but your behavior is sociopathic.

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117 Topic by Charles_F_Bell

(0 replies, posted in Literary Fiction)

I posted today a story that has existed in different forms previously. It has thematic content related to Weinstein, Spacey, et al. real stories, but not in the superficial way that every tale has two sides, though The Rape of Cassandra and The Seduction of Marco is an exercise in perspective writing, and certainly not of the form: A woman's rape is a man's seduction but rather that sexual misconduct, not so much being relative, is nuanced in motivation, from not being so much about sexuality but exertion of power (Weinstein, inmates in prison, etc.) or hormones on the immature brain or there being a multiplicity of reasons even within one individual (probably Louis C.K. and Woody Allen).

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118 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Janet Taylor-Perry wrote:

You have til the 18th this year. smile

The sort of distinction with a difference of a delayed execution by three days. Though in my case, I put my mind in a state of delusional denial till one who does love me, in spite of so many reasons not to, convinces me of the rightness of subjugating myself peacefully rather than by inconvenient coercion.

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119 Topic by Charles_F_Bell

(2 replies, posted in Literary Fiction)

I haven't abandoned TNBW Literary Fiction Forum, but the IRS looms over my house every 4/15 for such easy prey.

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120 Topic by Charles_F_Bell

(0 replies, posted in Literary Fiction)

As moderator of Literary Fiction Forum I am stating a policy that accepts posts, fiction or non-fiction, in this forum of original or appropriately cited quoted material up to 3000 words in length so long as it is accompanied by comment with regard to its Literary-Fiction relevance in order to engage discussion of actual written material rather than of an URL with little or no accompanying comment. In particular, if a Forum member has a whole or partial work of his own he wishes to tie to Literary Fiction criteria through specific notation and comment, he is encouraged to do so. Literary Fiction criteria includes but is not limited to:

1.    Is valued highly for its quality of form and creative use of language;
2.    Involves social commentary, or political criticism, or focus on the human condition.

A forum member poster is not encouraged to post material to elicit responses of “liking” it or commentary on plot and characterization or other such general fiction review. Restraint of political-philosophic bias for review comment is strongly suggested; e.g., “This is racist” or “This is misogynist” is not permitted without details respecting relevance to criterion number 2 above.

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121 Topic by Charles_F_Bell

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I never saw Lawrence in this light: anti-Zarathustra by ambivalence.

http://www.123helpme.com/view.asp?id=9350

This site strikes me as help to plagiarize your English Lit essay because there is no author cited.

Conclusion -

So it seems we cannot really discern (from this work Mercury at least) the answer to our question: does Lawrence hate people? Our uncertainty stems from Lawrence's uncertainty, reflecting his existence in a complex world full of difficult questions like ours. His answer, if he had a definite one, would probably depend on his mood at the moment. One thing is clear though: he has a particular disgust for those who find their answers in tested, socially honored sources like religion, society, and "properness" itself. In this Lawrence is much like Emerson, though from the opposite angle. Where Emerson gives us direct guidance, Lawrence gives us his view of what is "wrong." Surprisingly, they get similar results: Nature, instinct and self are the highest, truest powers. Both tell us to be "self-reliant." Of course, this is a bit paradoxical--someone telling you to listen only to yourself.

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122 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Nicholas Andrews wrote:
Charles_F_Bell wrote:

You can get a 100 Kindle RB stories for $10, but that is a royalty-fraction (10%?) of 10 cents = 1 cent per story to RB.

I looked up a Ray Bradbury collection on Amazon, and the ebook does not appear to be in KU. Being traditionally published, he does not likely have the same royalty split that self-publishers have with Amazon. But assuming he (or his publisher) did, he would be getting $7 out of that $10 purchase as his royalty. KU rates only apply to books borrowed through that program. Books can still be purchased through the regular store, where a self-published author gets 70% of royalties on books priced between $2.99 and $9.99.

I made the Bradbury example to illustrate a point on the cheapness of some short stories that word-for-word are often more valuable than most novels and on how there is still an element of unfairness of charging per page than on whole content. Even under a modern Kindle contract, Bradbury would net before taxes 7 cents per story.

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123 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Nicholas Andrews wrote:
njc wrote:

Being a quick study isn't necessarily a substitute for experience.  What do you say to giving the first book of a series to a well-recommended professional and doing subsequent books yourself, with the first book as a model?

If you have the money to spend, go for it. But after you learn how to format the subsequent books, you'll be wondering why you gave that money to someone else to do it in the first place.

There was a great blog post from an author named Kate Elle who made a very simple to use guide on how to make a clean ebook file using Word and Calibre. It's what I've always used as a model when making my ebooks. Unfortunately, she seems to have dropped off the face of the earth for a number of years and her website is now gone. Hopefully one day I'll get off my butt and make my own guide for new authors.

Calibre is self-evident. It's creating the input HTML document from Word that can be difficult.  You do not even have to make the ebook to upload to Amazon but rather that HTML document to Amazon specs. And then there's the cover art which not only takes computer skills not having anything to do with artistic talent but also a sense of what will sell the book.

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124 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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Nicholas Andrews wrote:

Kindle Unlimited used to pay the author the whole royalty if 10% of the book was read, and now it pays according to any large or small portion read.

This change was in response to all the scammer "authors" who would publish very short works that were in the 4-10 page range that were often nothing more than short how-tos with basic information that doesn't really tell you anything or "scamlets" that just had info on a subject copied from Wikipedia.

All the more reason there is a purpose served for the buyer-reader by the traditional publisher rather than a blind ebook publisher-merchant. In point of fact, I have seen the general scam of "legitimate" how-to books become epidemic on Kindle, so I seriously doubt there is any honest attempt by Amazon against that, per se. Wikipedia itself should be approached with caution, even disregarded entirely, especially on controversial subjects and persons. I cannot find any way to buy a nonfiction book through Kindle that works for me, but with fiction, at least, you know it is fiction, but even the presumption that a longer novel is a better, more expensive (through KU) book gets on my nerve in the same way there have been many short stories superior to typical novels but hard-to-find for the reader and unprofitable for the writer.  I'd give the same price in the under $10 range for a new-generation Ray Bradbury short-story than that crud The Martian. You can get a 100 Kindle RB stories for $10, but that is a royalty-fraction (10%?) of 10 cents = 1 cent per story to RB.

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125 Reply by Charles_F_Bell

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j p lundstrom wrote:

Found this site by accident while researching. It's evidently aimed at a younger audience, but it's still a riot. Does it resonate with you? It should, if you ever took an English class. I don't know about Dill and Charlie. (Happy birthday, Charlie.)

http://community.sparknotes.com/2017/01 … ?src=study

I think you are correct about the targeted audience. I like the link in Related Posts to Snapchats from Odysseus targeting I am sure a much smaller demographic.
http://community.sparknotes.com/2016/11 … m-odysseus


especially:
http://community.sparknotes.com/2016/11 … s/slide/13

Achilles, greatest of the greeks, breaker of men, a professional drama queen.

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