Pleased and Amused by My First Book
Aug. 29th, 2009 02:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
river_kateA little while ago the FedEx lady delivered the one copy of a Blurb book I created. It brightened my day although I can see how some things could have been done differently.
After being unable to figure out the requirements for the complimentary Create Space book for last year's NaNoWriMo novel mentioned in the previous post, I attempted to figure out how LuLu works. The novel, which is in a Word document is a combination of copy/paste from a LiveJournal account and direct writing in Word. The formatting was not acceptable to Lulu; it seemed there was a question of owning fonts.
No one I know is permitted to see this novel because the usual part about resemblance to people and places living or dead is not true in this case and there is some wicked, unflattering resemblances to people who have been, and some still are, in my life.
Next I registered for a Blurb account and downloaded the free software and through trial and error I created one book. Since everything about the process is so new to me, I could have messed with it endlessly. In the end, it came down to fun and curiosity over moving closer to better quality.
I chose a style that is meant for slurping a blog into a book and is set up for printing numerous 4-color photos. When I attempted to download my Word document into a black & white text book, all the different fonts I'd used showed up. Being unmotivated to retype the novel in Word and unwilling to spend $200(!) on having someone format it for me, I just slurped the blog; the size of the book is not the best for fiction.
Not having a digital camera, a few months ago I had photos I'd taken with a one-use camera put on a picture disk. For the first time, I downloaded or uploaded or whatever, the pictures and played with the cropping, etc. software. I added a few of those to my blog plus three I found on Flikr that only asked for attribution.
The text can be edited right in the bookmaking software and I accidentally deleted a whole page and simply left it out. The most glaring thing I would change is that the text is only right-aligned and the left side is raggedy. The new fan fiction one I'm writing is being done in a blog because I use two computers; I'm also typing it in a Word document where I can have the text aligned on both sides and use comic sans MS font. Online, I've learned that some people despise comic sans and there is even one group focused on getting it banned. It is my favorite.
Anyway, this has been worthwhile for me and I think my next effort will appear to be even better.
After being unable to figure out the requirements for the complimentary Create Space book for last year's NaNoWriMo novel mentioned in the previous post, I attempted to figure out how LuLu works. The novel, which is in a Word document is a combination of copy/paste from a LiveJournal account and direct writing in Word. The formatting was not acceptable to Lulu; it seemed there was a question of owning fonts.
No one I know is permitted to see this novel because the usual part about resemblance to people and places living or dead is not true in this case and there is some wicked, unflattering resemblances to people who have been, and some still are, in my life.
Next I registered for a Blurb account and downloaded the free software and through trial and error I created one book. Since everything about the process is so new to me, I could have messed with it endlessly. In the end, it came down to fun and curiosity over moving closer to better quality.
I chose a style that is meant for slurping a blog into a book and is set up for printing numerous 4-color photos. When I attempted to download my Word document into a black & white text book, all the different fonts I'd used showed up. Being unmotivated to retype the novel in Word and unwilling to spend $200(!) on having someone format it for me, I just slurped the blog; the size of the book is not the best for fiction.
Not having a digital camera, a few months ago I had photos I'd taken with a one-use camera put on a picture disk. For the first time, I downloaded or uploaded or whatever, the pictures and played with the cropping, etc. software. I added a few of those to my blog plus three I found on Flikr that only asked for attribution.
The text can be edited right in the bookmaking software and I accidentally deleted a whole page and simply left it out. The most glaring thing I would change is that the text is only right-aligned and the left side is raggedy. The new fan fiction one I'm writing is being done in a blog because I use two computers; I'm also typing it in a Word document where I can have the text aligned on both sides and use comic sans MS font. Online, I've learned that some people despise comic sans and there is even one group focused on getting it banned. It is my favorite.
Anyway, this has been worthwhile for me and I think my next effort will appear to be even better.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-30 01:16 am (UTC)I have always had this sneaking suspicion that when that's there, it's code for "Yes, you really ARE in my novel, so suck it up." :P When Jennifer Weiner's new book was released, I went to her book signing in NYC, and someone asked her if people recognized themselves in her writing if she "wrote them in" and she said that really only once had someone asked her directly and she turned it on them by saying "Now, why would you think THAT?" which sort of left the person in the position of either having to own up to what a bitch she was or say nothing and shrug. (The person chose the latter.) She said that what she's found is that the really evil ones totally don't recognize themselves because they have NO idea they are that bad.
But I still totally understand what you mean! :)
no subject
Date: 2009-08-30 06:26 pm (UTC)This reminds me of how Anne Lamott covered the topic in her book on writing...."Bird By Bird", I think it was. It was about character resemblence to men and she recommends including that the character has a very tiny penis and the real guy will be less likely to confront the writer.
I agree, awful people don't see themselves that way.