Category: self-publishing

Can Con 2023 Schedule

Anthologies, conventions, editing, marketing, podcast, podcast, self-publishing, Writing

The summer went by so fast! Now I’m suddenly scrambling to pull myself together for Can Con 2023, a writing and publishing convention held in Ottawa. Things were going well, I actually did a jog in the park yesterday, but then in the afternoon I lost my favorite pair of headphones in the supermarket and my day went haywire from then on (I found myself crawling on the supermarket floor in search of them in case they got kicked under the shelves, but they stayed lost).

Sometimes I feel like whenever I feel happy, that is when things go really wrong. Anyhow, I’m hoping things will go well at the conference now that my bad streak has happened…below is my schedule if you happen to be going to the conference, feel free to come chat with me!

The schedule looks action packed with lots of writing sessions, book launches and interesting topics about the future of publishing. It’s one of the few conferences left in Canada that features genre writing and it should be hopping!

Finally writing my second vampire book

Books, publishing, self-publishing, Uncategorized, Writing

For April’s NaNoWrimo camp I am writing the second book of my vampire series, The International House of Vampires. I should be writing, but I always seem to find things to distract myself because I am an Olympian at procrastinating! One of the reasons I am taking so long with the second book is because initially I was going to switch main character to a minor character and did write a fair bit, but one of my mentors told me to stick with Tamara, the main character, so I scrapped that version of the second book. The minor character was Latino and while doing research I was told to not write a main character that is non-Asian. Then my dad died and in the second book, a father figure dies, so I had a hard time continuing writing. After my dad died, a lot of things stopped for me and I was feeling like I was recovering when my mom and grandma died. I had written a novel about yokai hunting in San Francisco just before mom died and entered a contest with it (it lost) and am now looking for a literary agent. No one wants it so far and I will keep trying to bug agents and publishers.

In the first vampire book, Tamara lost her husband and in the second book it’s about her trying to find him in the Underworld. The Underworld is described very differently by the Buddhist versus Roman Catholic religions I was raised in. I never thought it was odd to have two religions in the household, my parents were very different people so it made sense while growing up. Anyhow, the Underworld I am creating in this book is a mish mash as well and since it’s the second book, I will have to self-publish since the publishers/agents queried with the first book didn’t want a multicultural vampire book using Taoism concepts to explain magic. Vampires also don’t drink blood, they suck chi energy and they vaccinated themselves against silver. For such old creatures, there should be improvements over time!

Now I am busy looking up my past manuscripts and picking and choosing what I want to use in this book. Nothing is ever wasted even if it’s tossed out because it’s practice for the final version! After I finish this book my family members can stop making fun of me not having a second books!

My initial scope was five books for International House of Vampires (not to be confused with International House of Pancakes apparently), but we will see. I’ve been writing more short fiction since they are easier to sell and less heart breaking than working on a book for five years that no one wants. Back to writing! Tut tut!

Doing my first live stream podcast interview and Medium personal essay about caring for the elderly during COVID

Anthologies, articles, asian, Books, branding, caregiving, children, death, editing, family, Medium, podcast, self-publishing, Uncategorized, Writing

Many months ago I was booked for an interview on the Lurking for Legends podcast and totally forgot about it until the host Richard H. Stephens sent an email with the live podcast link! Since my last blog post, my 106 year old grandma passed, so I had been busy planning another funeral and dealing with over zealous relatives who all have opinions but at the end of the day only me and my siblings were paying for this funeral.

Having done a few interviews in the past, the biggest difference in live streaming is the lack of opportunity to correct mistakes. It’s similar to giving a talk in public. It’s a good exercise in practicing improvisation because there will be questions asked which are not scripted and you have to pull yourself together to speak clearly. There were also questions from the audience via the Facebook live feed and I had to answer these on the fly too. I always think afterwards about how I could have sold things better (my husband says I am the worst salesperson!) but every experience makes the next one better.

Link to the interview here: https://fb.watch/bEvr6vdY34/

I haven’t written anything in a while, so I wrote a long personal essay called How COVID Affected the Care and Death of the Elderly In My Family. It’s a recap of what has happened over the last few months with my mother and grandmother before they died. Death is final and even conspiracy theorists can agree that such a thing will happen to all of us! Or maybe not…

Have a look at the essay here if you have time and please follow me on Medium if you can. To qualify for their partner program I need 100 followers but I only have 2. Yes, pretty sad, I know. In the near future I will be posting more on Medium and then mentioning them on my WordPress blog as larger pieces fit there better I think.

Have a great day and please stay safe!

The Artsy Raven Podcast is on Feedspot’s list of “Top 60 Literature Podcasts”!

Artsy Raven, podcast, self-publishing, Writing

The Artsy Raven Podcast was selected by Feedspot as one of the Top 60 Literature Podcasts & Top 10 Canadian Literature Podcasts on the web!

Click on the link I discovered I wasn’t #60 but #36. The list updates automatically based on number of hits. Hopefully over time the podcast will gain more listeners and gain more recognition for the guests on the podcast! Listening to so many authors gives me energy to keep writing as it is a difficult task to write since there is seldom much monetary gains for writers. There are only so many lottery winners like JK Rowling, so please keep your day job unless you have a sponsor!

In episode 26 of The Artsy Raven we spoke with Adam Jonathan Kaat who wrote about his experiences on the grocery retail floor during COVID. In our interview with him, he said he had to publish the book quickly because COVID is a timed event and the traditional publishing cycle takes so long! Episode links here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/ep-26-writing-57308566

Kevin Wong answers “What inspired you to write stories about Hong Kong?” on Artsy Raven Eps 9

Anthologies, Artsy Raven, ArtsyRaven, asian, editing, podcast, ricepaper magazine, self-publishing, Uncategorized, Writing, you tube

Kevin Wong was born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia: the same hometown as Sidney Crosby and Sarah McLachlan. He has always loved writing and creating art, and even as a child he was constantly drawing, painting, writing stories, and telling tales to his friends and family.

He answers the question “What inspired you to write stories about Hong Kong?” on the Artsy Raven podcast, Episode 9. This clip is an excerpt from the episode.

The Artsy Raven podcast about writing & publishing episodes are on Spotify & Youtube: https://jfgarrard.com/arpodcast/

Kirsten McNeill answers “How do you deal with a negative review?” on Artsy Raven Eps 6

Artsy Raven, ArtsyRaven, Books, business, editing, podcast, self-publishing, women, Writing, you tube

Kirsten McNeill is a writer, editor and business owner of KM Writing Services. She answers the question “How do you deal with a negative review?” on the Artsy Raven podcast, Episode 6. This clip is an excerpt from the episode.

Kirsten’s website is https://kirstenmcneill.com

The Artsy Raven podcast about writing & publishing episodes are on Spotify & Youtube: https://jfgarrard.com/arpodcast/

The Idea Shop answers “Why should an author hire a marketer?” on Artsy Raven Eps 5 podcast

Artsy Raven, Books, branding, business, marketing, podcast, self-publishing, Uncategorized, Writing, you tube

Chris Houston, the Marketing Guru of The Idea Shop has over 20 years of experience in book marketing. The Idea Shop is a one-stop shop for fresh new ideas on how to promote creative endeavors of all kinds, from books to podcasts. The Idea Shop can be heard each month on Sauga 960 AM radio.

He answers the question “Why should an author hire a marketer?” on the Artsy Raven podcast, Episode 5. This clip is an excerpt from the episode.

To contact the Idea Shop on how your book can be marketed to the world, find Chris at https://theideashop.ca/

The Artsy Raven podcast about writing & publishing episodes are on Spotify & Youtube: https://jfgarrard.com/arpodcast/

I will be a guest at #FIYAHCON 2021 (#BIPOC #Specfic #con) and speaking on panels about #publishing and #marketing! #diversity #diversityinpublishing

branding, conventions, diversity, marketing, self-publishing, Writing

During September 16-19, 2021, FIYAHCON 2021 is happening! It’s a BIPOC speculative fiction virtual convention where writers, artists, publishers, editors, marketers and vendors meet up. There are a limited number of free tickets available, do check it out if you have time!

As a guest I will be speaking at two panels:

Different Ways of Publishing – Saturday, September 18th, 2021, Day 2 – 11:40 am EST, Track B

  • Traditional publishing is often seen as the most common way of publishing, but over time, there are other methods: self-publishing, serial publishing, hybrid publishing, etc. This panel will explore different methods of publishing because sometimes getting an agent or traditional publisher may not be possible if the book is considered “too niche” or “unmarketable”.

Strategies on Publicizing Your Book – Saturday, September 18th, 2021, Day 2 – 12:50pm EST, Track A

  • A book is a baby you need to present to the world that is already filled will millions of babies. How do you find your readers? Let’s talk about Kickstarters, PR firms, paid and free strategies you can use to publicize your books.

For these panels I am also a moderator so over the next few days I will be contacting my fellow panelists to brainstorm and to write up speaking notes for engaging panels.

Hope to see you there!


Tools to make an awesome #lowbudget #video for #socialmedia!

Books, branding, business, marketing, self-publishing, Uncategorized, you tube

Recently I signed up my indie publishing company, Dark Helix Press, to be a vendor at FIYAHCON, a virtual convention centering the perspectives and celebrating the contributions of BIPOC in speculative fiction. (I’ll be speaking about publishing there too, will release details when I have them.)

At FIYAHCON the vendors are setting up a virtual table on a platform called AirMeet which I have never used before. One of the items I needed to upload was a video and I don’t have any book trailers for Dark Helix Press. In the past I made a book trailer for The Undead Sorceress which was ok, but with new tools available, making a trailer now is much faster than ever before! The concept of making a trailer is the same to make any video for social media, once you learn how to make on video, it’s a skill which can be used for lots of creative fun!

The trailer I made below took about three hours, because I was fiddling with fonts/colors/layout and made some custom graphics for the Dark Helix Press Threadless Shop merchandise because I wanted “clean cut” items that would “pop out.” I had to use a graphic editor to do that (did it quick and dirty with the free Paint.net graphic program) because video programs have limited graphics editing capabilities. Note I had $0 budget, but the video looks pretty good for zero dollars!

Steps used to make a book trailer:

  1. List out what you want to put in each “slide” which is really a short video. Pretend it’s a PowerPoint and on each slide think about what message or text you want to convey.
  2. Find videos for each slide. There are a couple of sites you can download free videos, such as Pexels, Pixabay, Mixkit, etc. We used Pixabay.
    • For one video we wanted 14 seconds, but the shot we downloaded was 10 seconds, so we extended the video time by slowing down the speed of the footage.
  3. If you are adding extra graphics to the video, you will need to clean up with a graphics editor such as Paint.net, Krita, Adobe Photoshop, etc. We used Paint.net.
  4. Pick a program to compile the videos – Canva, Filmgora, iMovie, etc. We used Canva.
  5. Upload the videos into the program, add text, music (we used the music provided in the program) and graphics.
  6. In some of the programs you can modify the layout and animate the graphics/fonts.
  7. Upload onto Youtube and publish.
    • Read carefully on the sites where you gathered graphics, videos and music. Some of the licenses ask for attribution in lieu of payment and there may be restrictions on use.

I hope this information was useful to you! After you do it once, the subsequent videos will be easier next time!

Being Inspired by ND Jones’ #African #Fantasy #Romance #Writing! @ndjonesauthor #writinglife #publishing #AfricanAmerican

Books, branding, diversity, podcast, publishing, self-publishing, Uncategorized, Writing

For episode 22 of The Artsy Raven podcast, I interviewed ND Jones, a USA Best-selling author who has written multiple African fantasy romance series. It was really inspiring to listen to someone has achieved so much on their own and even got her whole family involved! She’s written over twelve books and even started a company which involves her daughter doing graphic design work and her son creating a RPG game based on her work.

One of the reasons why she started writing was because there was a void in the market with positive, sexy, and three-dimensional African American characters as soul mates, friends, and lovers, so she took on that challenge herself. Her book covers look super awesome with strong females on them and I had a good time talking to her about her projects. Although I don’t write fantasy romance, I would like to write more and complete more projects. I have problems finishing things and would like to be like ND Jones when I grow up!

ND is also giving away two e-books (she reads from one of them in the podcast) and a $10USD Amazon gift card to two winners. King Sumo link here: https://kingsumo.com/g/tw9ne1/nd-jones-e-book-and-amazon-gift-card-giveaway-august-16-28-2021-2-winners

Spotify episode link: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4AcPxpL3lpVQQDnGKBXyGS

Youtube episode link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nlcJUicKFE&feature=youtu.be

The Artsy Raven August newsletter is out and we have links to over 40 free fantasy books! Check it out here.

Have a great day!