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Am I sitting comfortably?

8/13/2019

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In my Real World job, I do a great deal of sitting.  I don't like sitting much.  I work in a library and would much rather be in the stacks - I'll do anything as long as it's with a book rather than a human being.  But this isn't how the real world works out.  I sit in front of a computer for hours at a time and deal with the Dreaded Public.  
The chairs at work are, of course, ancient and ghastly and horrendously uncomfortable.  It was only after six months of agony that one of my colleagues remembered the "Vulcan" chair.  Vulcan was his real name, a Turkish bloke who had once worked in the library before returning to Turkey with his family.  He'd had back problems too and a special chair had been bought for him.  It was bloody brilliant, that chair - I was comfortable from the first moment I sat in it.  I was quite happy to remain in the Vulcan chair for the rest of my prison sentence. 
Sorry, I mean, work life.
However, a new young bloke was then hired for the afternoon shift.  Also tall, he preferred the Vulcan chair as well and an all-out battle has ensued.  As his shift starts at 1.30, halfway through my lunch hour, he will invariably be sitting in the chair when I come back from lunch.  Feeling mean and guilty, I would have to ask for the chair, feeling that it was somehow my fault that he had to sit in one of the crap chairs.  The fact that he is 30 years younger than I am and has never had a day's back pain makes no difference - I am the one in the wrong.  
I raised this issue at a staff meeting and my manager got so irritated with me that she has barely spoken to me since.  The fact that she sits in an extremely fancy chair, the sort you might expect to see on the bridge of a spaceship, isn't lost on me.  However, the issue desk manager was far more interested in my plight and set about the long process of getting me a new chair.  This has involved several million emails and an appointment with Occupational Health, an event
made excruciating by the fact that the interviewer was being examined and she kept looking at the examiner instead of me.  Hello.  I'm the person getting a sore neck because you've placed my chair at a right angle to your desk.  Honestly, the shit you go through just to get a chair.
Anyway, this is how I've ended up in a Chair Lab testing chairs.  I didn't even know we had a chair lab.  It seems to be used primarly by disabled students who have access to better equipment in the lab than anywhere else.  When I say" lab" I don't mean bright, white, shiny and clean.  No windows, stuffy and hot, chairs higgledy-piggledy all over the place.  Screens at odd angles.  No eating because of mice.  So less of the "lab" than just "basement room."
Today I'm spending an hour sitting on each chair I've chosen (I managed to narrow it down to three) in order to decide - and I have to get it right because this is money being spent On Me.  The best one has a rocking action which means I can get up quickly (there's a lot of bouncing up and down at work, fetching stuff and helping people etc) but it doesn't have great upper back support.  The one with the best upper back support kind of "hugs" you but it also forces your elbows forward slightly.  Not comfy.  And the third option doesn't do anything discernible except be a chair. 
In the end, I'd be happy to stay in the Vulcan chair.  None of this would be happening if it wasn't for the fact that the manager is all over the new young guy at work, simply because he is young and a guy.  She doesn't like women unless they fawn at her feet.  As I don't, I've been rendered invisible.  Why can't I get another chair like the Vulcan one?  Because that option wasn't available.  And besides, I was supposed to be getting a new chair because the Vulcan chair isn't good enough.  I've actually gone through this whole rigmarole so that a squit of 23 can stop sighing heavily whenever he has to give up The Best Chair.
Hey, you know what, I've just realised - for about the hundred millionth time - that I really fucking hate my job.  I mean, it was inevitable.  I was always doomed to hate everything that wasn't staying at home and being a writer, which is what I like doing best (even if it doesn't pay).  It goes without saying that my chair at home.  Is.  Bliss.  

Picture
I'm thinking I'll go with this one
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​Is it worth bringing out new editions of your self-published books?

8/8/2019

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Yes, definitely.  I could just leave it there!  There are so many reasons, not least of which is checking for errors.  I personally like updating my published books if I bring out a new book – I would definitely want to add a blurb for the new book at the back of the earlier books! 
When I realised I was two books behind, new editions became vital.  Not only did I want to add “Commences” to the “Also by ….” but also add its blurb to the Fleet Quintet novels at the back of the book.  I decided to go several steps further, though, and standardise the layout of every single edition.  For the paperbacks, this mean the same font, the same size font, the same layout, the same fancy font for the title page and chapter titles etc etc. For the ebooks, there’s slightly less work as the font type and size is the same throughout, but an ebook gives you the chance to add links.  And you have to make sure that every single one works.
This is a lot of work.
I have six published novels, one published novella and ten published short stories.  There are three different platforms:  KDP ebook, KDP paperback, and Smashwords.  This means that I may be working on three different editions of one single title. Once you start multiplying these numbers, you may understand why I felt a bit exhausted just contemplating so much work.  I mean, why bother. 
Pride comes into it.  As well as the desire to have a beautiful product to sell.  Quite a few of my books are going to be getting gorgeous new professional covers.  I want the inside to look professional as well!  Yes, I know – lots of people get OTHER people to do the work for them.  This is not how I work.  I know what I want and how I want it and I know I can do a good job.  Why pay for something that just requires time, patience and dedication?
I may be completely mad by the end of summer but I will also be able to move on from my beautiful new editions to other things.  All those other novels that are dying to be written!  As September always feels like a fresh start to the year, I aim to have my new editions out by the end of August.  Providing I don’t go completely cross-eyed checking all the font sizes of the return marks…….

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Something to sing about
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When self-publishing becomes a major league drag

8/2/2019

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Picture
Just uploaded my gorgeous new cover (from The Cover Collection) for THE EXODUS SEQUENCE!  It's considerably more noticeable than the cover I cobbled together, with really rich, bright colours and spacey enough to tell what genre it is.

I also shortened the very long and clunky subtitle:  "A Collection of Connection Science Fiction Novelettes".  There were two things wrong with this.  First, it wasn't accurate.  The collection contains fantasy, horror and experimental as well.  Secondly, the word "novelettes" is extremely dodgy.  Technically, it's entirely accurate.  A novelette is longer than a short story but shorter than a novella.  Most of the stories in this collection are quite long, so it seemed quite a good idea to call them novelettes.  

However, the word "novelette" has a derogatory meaning which I didn't know about.  Novelettes are usually lightweight romances, rather trivial and flimsy - at least, they used to be.  While this meaning is no longer in use, it was enough to tarnish the word for me and I decided to drop it from the subtitle.  It's kind of long and clumsy anyway - I thought my short story collection would do better if I called it just that:  "A Collection of Connected Short Stories."

All this is just great.  There's just one thing that has gone horrible wrong:  Amazon hates it.  Amazon won't change the subtitle.  It's a technical thing to do with ISBNs and such (so this affects the paperback, not the ebook) but however you look at it, I can't change it.  Or the website won't let me.  Amazon Bookshelf is perfectly aware that I've changed the subtitle as I've already uploaded the lovely new cover, but even so:  it won't give me access to changing the details.
Well, fuck, is about all I can say.  The only option I have is to unpublish the current edition of The Exodus Sequence and publish a whole new one.  Because, you know, I just don't have enough complications in my life and I've got SO much time.  Worse, the immense of work I do to get my books out there doesn't make a blind bit of difference.  The hours, the time, the blood, sweat and tears - the many, many tears - none of it has paid off in any way at all.  Who on God's earth is going to even notice that I have a whole new edition out there when no one even noticed the first edition.
It's all very sucky and I may just abandon the attempt in favour of lunch.

In the meantime, enjoy my lovely new cover.

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