Building Content: Think King Arthur, Not Genghis Khan

I'm rather bummed that most of my last few blog posts have just been links to my work-related posts at digitalrelevance. (That doesn't mean I'm going to stop doing it, just that I'm bummed about it.)

Kindle Worlds: Will True Communities Get Lost in the Amazon?

I'm not a fan of Amazon. I've heard too many horror stories, seen too much mistreatment, and watched the company scrub out the spirit of entrepreneurship and capitalism too often. Amazon is the online equivalent of Wal-Mart.

And I'm less than happy with Wal-Mart.

Having said this, it should come as no surprise that I'm not shaking the pom-poms about Amazon's newest venture Kindle Worlds, a marketplace specifically for fan fiction. Amazon has negotiated copyright agreements with a small handful of brand rights-holders to let their fan fiction writers publish their works free and clear of any copyright problems.

This may be the second-worst thing Fifty Shades of Grey has ever done.

I talk about the main players in this venture and what they have to gain and lose over at the digitalrelevance™ blog. Check out The Four Faces of Amazon's Foray into Fan Fiction: Kindle Worlds.

The Book Is Here!

Big announcement day! Presenting not one but two books with my name on the cover!

The first is Duncan and the Lonely Giant. I wrote it as a Christmas present for my younger son last November, but I only just now got around to getting it printed up, right in time for summer break.

Possibly coming soon to an e-reader near you.

This book isn't widely available, though — I printed only three copies. One for my son, one for my mom, and one for me. After I get a few opinions, I might take this one to Smashwords.

The other book is the previously promised e-book collection Seasonal Work. And you can actually read this onenow! Go get your copy at Smashwords, and don't forget tell me what you think of it.

Even if you don't like it.

Writing to the Smallest Audience

My first blog post with digitalrelevance is up over at their blog. It's about the idea of writing to just one person instead of to a broad, varied audience. Check it out, and make me look good at my new job.

Time Flies When You're Having a Breakdown

Did you miss me?

Yes, my plan to celebrate National Poetry Month with daily poetry readings fell through. And yes, on top of that, I haven't posted in two weeks.

And yes, I went to the annual conference of the American Copy Editors Society (ACES) and haven't even blogged about that yet. But I have a good excuse: I took a new job.

And the Winner Is...

Thank you to the seven of you who entered my 500th-post contest!

That's right, seven of you. As if I have a seven-sided die.

Instead of going to any great lengths to pick one of seven, I did the unfair thing. I eliminated Tony Noland from the running and used a standard, six-sided die to make a decision among the rest of you.

(Why Tony? Because I had already planned to send him a free copy of the finished e-book anyway.)

So I rolled a die and counted down from the top of the list, in the order that I saw them (reverse chronological). And the winner is . . .

 

Chuck Allen!

So, Chuck, I'll be contacting you in the near future.

Everyone else keep an eye on this space for my forthcoming e-book later this month.

We'll try this contest thing again when I hit 1,000 posts, sometime in 2018.

Today's Poem: Oh Captain! My Captain!

Today I feature a Walt Whitman poem whose opening exclamation was made famous (at least to people of my generation) by the wonderful and wonderfully sad movie Dead Poets’ Society. It appears in his famous collection Leaves of Grass in a section called “Memories of President Lincoln,” and it’s a great example of metaphor.

Today's Poem: John Clare

Today's poem comes from John Clare, an Englishman who spent a lot of time in British asylums. He couldn't always remember who he was and at times claimed to be married to women he wasn't married to, and even claimed to be Lord Byron or William Shakespeare.

Whether his poems, which were distinctly unselfconscious, were a reflection of his mental problems or an escape from them is anyone's guess. But here is one in which he recognized who he was.

Today's Poem: Complaint of the Skeleton to Time

Today's reading is not of my doing, but of the poet's . . . and his friends. Here is Allen Ginsberg reading his own poem, "Complaint of the Skeleton to Time," from the album The Lion For Real (and courtesy of Spotify).

Today's Poem: The City in the Sea

The City in the Sea

by Edgar Allan Poe

(1809–1848)