RP vs. AE

As many of you might know, I'm back to being a university student. I'm doing English Language and Literature, even though I could certainly do without the literature part of it. But that's not really the point. The point is that this term I'm doing Phonetics and Varieties of English and everyone was given a choice; RP or AE (otherwise known as Received Pronunciation, or British English, and American English). 

Now, Im hoping to go to England in the fall and continue my education there. So of course I chose RP. However, my grammar is another matter. I'm writing American style, or at least I did until we started with Phonetics and I suddenly switched over to RP. Now I'm doing something in-between the two, but I've decided to turn my grammar over to RP as well. Best not go all the way, right? 

So yeah. My stories from now on will be written in British English, not American. This also quite fit with what I'm working on; the Their Circumstances series, as that one is set in London. 

When I wrote Yesterday's Tears, I was still writing with American spelling and such, but I did try to use well-known British words, such as "mum" instead of "mom". Now ... I just want to go through the entire thing and redo it. I want it all in RP. 

It's safe to say that everything else from now on will be written in British English. That's really all I wanted to say. Have a good weekend peeps!

Tracking wordcount

I decided to start tracking my word count this year. I haven't done this properly since '09. I found a yearly review I posted on Livejournal, which was quite interesting. In January that year I wrote 52K in a month. That's the month I finished the first version of Polar Nights. Also wrote 52K in November, and then I wrote Northern Skies, sequel to PN. 

In December 2009 I wrote approximately 60K! I was shocked when I saw it, because I've never thought I'd ever written so much in a month ever. According to the post I wrote both Winter Love and Sakura Kiss, and started Moscow Nights. It was surely one crazy month! 

So I've decided to track my wordcount this year. I think it'll better my ability to write, because now that I know what I write everyday I want to at least try to write something every day. I'm sad to say that I didn't write anything yesterday (I was moving stuff and watching Merlin), but I'm getting back to the writing today. 

I've made one lovely Excel spreadsheet to track both yearly wordcount, divided by month, as well as a spreadsheet for my projects, divided by both month and week. 

So last week, the first week of the year, I wrote a stunning 9.2K! I finished the third and last Silver/Kian short and started in on Measured Doses, my first threesome. That's a pretty good first week, if I do say so myself. 

If I want to get anywhere near 9K for this week though, I should really get started. Wish me luck!

Tips on marketing?

I am at a loss when it comes to marketing. A lot of authors do it, but I don't really know what they do. I have a website, I have this blog, I have a twitter, I have a facebook. I don't feel like I'm getting any responses though, so maybe I'm not doing it right? 

I see a lot of other authors do guestblogging and interviews and giveaways and blog tours, but I'm at a loss as to how they manage it.

How do other authors market themselves and their books? Have you got any tips and tricks?

What Makes Your Eyes Roll?

So, there's a couple of things that makes me roll my eyes if I read it in fiction. And if I read those things, it pulls me out of the story. What are those things, you probably wonder? I'll share them with you. 

First off, instant love. That just doesn't do it for me, unless it's extremely well-written and there's a very good reason for it. Like in fantasy stories or paranormal. I just cn't buy this in contemporary stories though. It's too far fetched. Instant attraction sure, but not instant love. You can't love someone instantly; it's somehting that comes with time.

Second, every damn man being so well-hung. Yeah, because that's realistic. Or not. By well-hung they're normally way above average, and normally the bigger than any other the bottom has ever been with. Um, right. When I write my stories, my characters, not a one of them are extremely big down there. They're average guys with an average dick-size.

I think it would be refreshing to read about someone who actually worries about the size of his cock. Who worries that he isn't big enough and that he can't please enough. Because that's realistic. I have to admit that I haven't so far written any characters like this, but I'd like to. My characters aren't normally very well-hung either, it's just not something that's really mentioned. Because their significant other likes their cock, no matter the size of it. 

Third, when they howl during sex. Are you a werewolf? No. Then don't howl. I have never heard anyone howl during sex in my life. Whoever does that, unless of course they are a werewolf? But no one is a werewolf in contemporary, ordinary stories. So just stop it. Nothing makes me roll my eyes more than seeing the world howl. Scream too, and any other such high-pitched sounds. 

Sex can sure be vocal; with panting and moans and groans. You can cry out, but you do not scream. To me that connotes fright. You're not afraid during sex. If you're being violates, yes, but not during mutual sex. It's just to silly for words. I'm sorry, but it's a definite eye-roller for me.

What makes your eyes roll when you read? Is it the same that does it for me, or is it something else entirely?

Blogspot vs. Livejournal: Which One Do You Prefer?

I have a limited memory, so whatever I write in this post might not be quite accurate. I remember posting a lot over on my LJ blog when I still went under the name of Kizuna online. I got to know a lot of great people over there, most of which I've sadly lost contact with. I loved my LJ and posted on it constantly. 

But I also had a blogspot blog. Also under the name of Kizuna, if I remember correctly. I posted one of my very first English-written, m/m series on such a blog. That blog is still up, but it's private. I'm a little melancholy about it, it was my first series after all, and I was proud of it back then. 

But back to the point. All my old blogs were deleted when I created my pseudonym. I now have one LJ blog and one blogspot blog under my name. Before, this one was all but abandoned as I was an avid user of LJ. 

Then, last month, I wanted to fix this blog up and do something with it. LJ frustrated me to no end (everything about it frustrated me; to the site always being down all the way to the post form), so I gave up on it. And upon fixing this blog up, giving it a new makeover and deleting all the old entries and tags, I realizing I quite like Blogger. 

Blogger gives me more freedom than LJ ever did. Except layout, LJ will always have the best layouts, though you can find some pretty cool free ones for blogspot too! But it's so not enough to keep me around anymore. I set this blog up with a light color scheme, sidebar on both sides of the posts. I think this blog is quite neat and ordered and I love it to death. It gives me the opportunity to schedule posts, which is great because I don't have time everyday to sit down and write them. I hear you can do this on LJ now too, but ... nah, I have fallen in love with blogspot. 

And I think we're mostly going to be staying monogamous to each other. Mostly because there are certain people I still stalk on LJ, but I'm secretly hoping that maybe they'll all convert to blogspot sometime in the future. It's so much simpler and easier.

My favorite thing is the blog list. You can have every person you follow right there, and whenever they update their blog or their site, they'll be on top of the blog list. Pretty awesome. I like it a lot better than the LJ friends page where I have to scroll down through every update.

What I liked about LJ is the LJ cut. I hate it when long posts, mainly story excerpts, take over the whole page. So a LJ cut was pretty nice. But blogspot has that too! Not only that, I feel its easier to add images, easier to to format the blog post; simply everything is easier. 

Blogger and I agree with each other. I like it here in blogspot land. So I'm staying put. 

How about you? Blogspot or livejournal? Feel free to comment or choose your answer on the poll in the sidebar!

Coming: Day Of Porn

Next Monday is Day of Porn, and it's hosted by the lovely Samantha. As for what Day of Porn it is, I'll quote Sam: "Day of Porn is as the name implies. It's just a day for writers/readers to put aside their more serious fic and indulge in shameless porn. That's really it."

Some basic rules:

* no min/max word count
* no limit to how many contributions you can make
* open to fic or pic
* doesn't have to be porn (but it's more fun)
* open to slash or het, original or fanfic
* please apply appropriate warnings as necessary (eg, incest, anthro, poly, etc)
* we prefer see new stuff, but we'll count anything that was posted after July 1, 2012
* feel free to pimp! ^_^

I was actually going to participate for this last year too, but I think I was on vacation, so I didn't manage it. I'll be sure to make up for it this year! I have started one story for Day of Porn, it's completely stand-alone for now, though I suspect maybe more plot-bunnies will creep in on me. 

I'm going to try to write at least two stories though. Maybe there's a character or a couple of mine you'd like to see more off? Please feel free to come with requests.

Series' blogs

I have blogs for all of my series. They're all currently set on private, so that only I can access them, but I'm thinking about making them available for others to see as well. Especially the blogs for the series that have published books.

The blog for Legend & Lore is the one that I'm happiest about, the one that is best suited for the public eye. But I have one for Arctic Love and Seasonal Love as well, and one for Scarred Souls (whose title just changed from Troubled Minds).

My idea for these blogs is to post stuff that I won't here on this one, such as character portraits and stuff like that. Some things will be double posted, such as new releases and covers. 

I also have one for Apocalypse, but I need to finish that particular book before that blog can open up. I quite like the blog though, but it's out-dated. I've changed a lot of stuff since I made it, and character portraits posted on the blog don't match what the characters are like or who the characters are in love with anymore.

I know that I personally like seeing series' blogs, though I haven't seen many off them. At least not many m/m series' blogs. If I do this, the one for Scarred Souls will be the most active one, as it has so many characters and so many things going on. 

What do you, as another author or as a reader, feel about series' blogs?