Down a Rabbit Hole Part 1

Oh my.  If I were being less than politically correct, there would probably be a few inappropriate adjectives as well.  Why, one might ask?  Well, let me share today's newest journey down the Rabbit Hole.  (I foresee this being an ongoing theme in the weeks and months to come, so it will be serialized.)

So, to begin:  I have mentioned that I am working with the new website Pronoun for an online only platform for my book, Death's End.  I went to that site today to update a few things, and down one hole I went.

Who knew that newsletters were a thing? I certainly didn't.  But having emerged on the other side, no doubt now in Wonderland, I have officially signed up for an account to now write newsletters to send to my readers (who I'm still trying to figure out who, what, where, when, even why they are).  Anyway, in case anyone is interested, here is a link. https://tinyletter.com/legibler.  For those wondering about newsletter's as I was, may I recommend the following website: https://writersinthestorm.wordpress.com/2013/07/05/the-how-and-why-of-author-newsletters/.  As for the rest of us, shall we see how far this rabbit hole goes?

After I emerged from that particular hole (and I'm not entirely certain I actually have), I went down another: my personal website and Facebook page.  I don't know about the majority of the population, but I am not a fan of Facebook.  I don't like sharing my "relationship status", and the amount of oversharing is truly staggering. That being said, I am well aware that there is a benefit to it form a business standpoint.  Having updated that as well as my author page courtesy of Wix.com, well...

Somewhere in the middle of my day, I stumbled upon Medium.  This does, for all intents and purposes, appear to be a website just for writing and reading.  On the surface, it sounds like a lovely idea.  (But let me not forget the very best such site, Writers Carnival).  As I do need to wrap up in order to complete my weekend without stressing over upcoming exams, I did not take the time to start down yet another rabbit hole and create from scratch works.  Instead, I thought it best to share a friend of the feline variety. (Secret Agent Cat Volume 1)

Now, having updated my personal website, my author's Facebook page, created a new account on Medium and a newsletter on TinyLetter, what is left?  Well, I think that would be for me to return to the mundane world and finish up my homework. Anything more, and there's no telling where this Alice might end up.

Nothing Ventured...

One of these days, I am going to sit down and write a long blog about how much I hate statistics class, but this is not that day.

(The mistake being the fault in taking statistics to begin with)

No, this day is all about trying new things.  Those new things today refer to the self publishing platform Pronoun.  

In previous self publishing endeavors, I have gone through CreateSpace.  Anyone who has wanted to see their words in print has probably at least considered this particular avenue, but having reached a point where the old is growing stale, I decided to branch out.

For those of you who were successful with NaNoWriMo this year, Pronoun was one of the offers.  I decided, what the hell, and signed up.  Now, it has, admittedly, taken me two months to finish, but then, well, that's life.  

Still, with a new platform, I decided to try a new everything.  Rather than the young adult fiction I have been working with on CreateSpace, I decided to throw into the world one of my more unique endeavors.  Death's End (link to come) is about Persephone, a reaper who collects souls for Death.  And I fell away from all the previous constraints about where a plot should start and end, and I'm sure I'll someday be reviewed mercilessly for my endeavor, but it felt so right for this story.  And what better story to share on this new platform than one that is a bit of a non sequitur?

So far, I have nothing but positive things to say about Pronoun.  They very helpfully had guidance for formatting, the process itself was painless, and I love the final product as it stands.  Going forward, who knows, but then:

I've decided to add on a quick note to this particular post.  While it will take me a week to have further updates on how well Pronoun works for me, and realistically even more time than that, I just want to say, again, to anyone out there who is interested, that if all you truly want is to hold your written work in your hands, then I can offer no greater option than Createspace.  I had some issues with cover and formatting when I worked with Lulu when I first started out.  They are set up almost identically, but I tried to shift my Lulu work from hardcover to soft and the images never made the cross.  So, if anyone out there is like me and just wants to hold their "precious", then I suggest going cheap.  Worst case scenario, you can always start from scratch later (which I hope to start in on later in the year as well - updates to follow).  For what it's worth, there is my two cents on the weekend.  Now, off to "creatively write" my research paper.  Ah, school.

*** Spelling corrections courtesy of my mother (who has finally read my blog)