Saturday, August 4, 2012

Yadda Yadda ...Blog Blog...Right: Write!


I've written 175 posts for this blog; this one is 176. Didn’t think I’d ever have that much to say!


And each one, though I haven’t counted, is anywhere from 350 to 700 words. Most fall into the 500 to 600 word range. So, making a generalization here by assuming the average is 500 words; doing the simple math we arrive at 87,500 words.


That’s enough for a book!


Is it time for me to write a book? I think about it a lot. I know people read my posts (which I appreciate very much). Yeah, my readership isn’t on a grand scale, but I’m pleased with the growth since putting some extra push and punch into things starting last October. 


Ah, that book and my thoughts on that. Fact: I’ve done a little teaching in a classroom setting and I really do enjoy helping people. And I’ve decided that it will be an eBook. 


A couple of subjects I can do:

  • Blogging. I get a lot of inquiries about it and people have said nice things to me regarding my know-how. I’m grateful for the kudos.
  • out of ideas


Uh, that’s one. Was thinking about doing helpful hints for succeeding in social media and discussing strategies, but don’t want to give away the store. Some of that information you will find in my blogs but you’ll have to hunt and peck a bit. The rest of it resides here with me and is reserved for my clients. 


Let’s face it folks. I’ve been doing business writing for, um, a very long time. A full-fledged serious book would be painful for me to write and not fun. And, I DO have the beginnings of something fictional. The beginning thoughts are documented anyway. 


My objective is to take the reader to another place (out of this world) yet have things that are familiar to them in it. The premise is quirky; the characters will be even more so. Not sure if I want to write about a murder, but a mystery is possible. Will there be romance too? Perhaps just a hint where it would make sense to include it into the story.
The story would include a lot of things that I am passionate about thus making it an enjoyable experience for me. The first will be an eBook and the second a full-fledged novel, backtracking to a past place in time that secures the whole foundation for a possible series.


Does this make sense to you? Since I’ve already written 87,500 words, there’s proof it can be done. For the record, I’ve written 26 blogs for Groovy Reflections, my other endeavor, where I have others contribute as well. So assuming those are 500 words each, that’s 13,000. 


Over 100,000 words! Yadda yadda yadda. Yeah, you haven’t heard the last of me yet. There’s more to say. But enough for this one. Keeping it under 500 words today. 


The Raspberries sang about have a hit in 1974. And hey! Stop by and say hi!: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, or the website.



5 comments:

Sue said...

Can't wait to see what you produce, Gerry! You can yadda, yadda, yadda your way right up the Amazon charts!

Julia Hidy said...

Gerry, There's very good news: Most e-books are now in the 10,000 to 30,000 word range. I'm a business writer too, and it would be less work than an annual report. Trust me!

At a 5.5 x 8.5" format, and if you want to put it into print after you do the ebook, write or cut & paste about 130-140 pages or 30,000 to 40,000 words, depending on the font. And you're done. I've even seen guys design their own cover in MS Word! So you are WAY over on word count and it could be a 'best of' while still hanging onto your secrets.

Type in Word, save as a doc first, then save as a .html filtered file. Use Calibre to convert to Mobi (easy peasy), proof on Kindle Preview, upload to Kindle. Get coffee. You're done...well, almost. Then use marketing chops to promote it.

And have a ton of fun meeting even more new people along the way. Cheers,
Julia Hidy
Author, Energy for Your Life Series
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0082RBBH4 on KDP promo until Fri and so you can reach me if you have questions about formating for Kindle or KDP promos. :)

Anonymous said...

I can't wait for the book! I love your blogs, so I know I will love your book!!

Mary in Alabama

@kstaxman said...

Well I would love to see you try and if you finish one I would be more than happy to read it. Your writing certainly is good enough you just need to get motivated... LOL PS added you as a friend on G+ just so I could read a little more of your stuff.

@kstaxman said...

Thanks for all the great advice for such a short reply you've given us all we need to know to get started with a first ebook.