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Archive for the ‘Culture’ Category

The Reformation, Part Deux

Posted in Hi Tech, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on 15 Feb 2013| Leave a Comment »

Stack of BooksA follow-up to my earlier post about reformatting print-ready files for e-book readers…

In case these two points didn’t register in that post, here they are again:

  • Take Your Time…
  • Check Your Work…

I spent many hours over the past couple of days struggling with the files for FC Books II-V. I took my own advice (see above) and carefully and deliberately went through each reformation step, file by file. Then I uploaded the reformatted files and downloaded the KDP-converted files (in MOBI format) Then I previewed each MOBI file, using the Kindle Previewer, taking care to preview each file in each of the possible devices, from Kindle DX to iPad.

What I found was that while everything was fine on Kindle hardware, something was throwing off all the formatting when the MOBI file was ported to the iOS hardware. On iPads and iPhones, all my careful font styles were dropped and the whole shebang popped up in Courier New monospaced font. Ick.

Luckily, I had one file that was working on iOS (FC:I) so it was just a matter of comparing that file to the other files and trying to find the one thing that was causing the KDP conversion software to have a hissy-fit. I don’t know exactly what it was or exactly why, and I won’t bore you with details too tedious to be suffered. Suffice it to say that I was able to create files that work on all devices.

However, I still have not released FC:II-V into the e-book wild. I’m taking even more time, and will upload them all to my Kindle account, so I can see them on a Kindle, an iPad, and an iPhone for myself.

But it brings home my admonitions: Take Your Time and always Check Your Work.

That is all.

k

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Winter’s Edge

Posted in Low Tech, Seattle, tagged , , , , , , on 14 Feb 2013| 1 Comment »

Misty MorningOur drive west to the ocean is quiet, the road hissing beneath our tires, the drizzle hiding the greater world around us. It is just us, the dashed stripe down the pavement, and the last vestiges of winter along the highway’s edge.

Washington is the Evergreen State, and it is always, ever, green; winter or summer, rain or sunshine, something is always green. In this season, it is the cedars, pines, firs, and spruce. They covered the hillsides and the slopes between us and the limits of the grey-misted world: tall, shaggy, dark green sentinels ranked in thick forest ranks, or short, stripling, pale green youngsters rising from the steaming refuse of clear-cut acreage. But not everything is green.

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The Reformation

Posted in Hi Tech, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on 12 Feb 2013| 1 Comment »

As promised, I’ve begun to release the Fallen Cloud Saga in e-book format. And, just as I decided on CreateSpace to be my “publisher,” I’ve decided on the Kindle for my e-book format. The reasons are basically the same as before: ease of use, platform reach of the product, and essential friendliness of the agreement. Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) website is easy and reliable.

But I just can’t take my print-ready files and use them to build an e-book. Well, okay, I can, but I shouldn’t. Print-ready files are just that: print-ready, not e-book ready. To work best, e-books need to be reformatted; not much, just a little more here, a little less there, but they need it and it’s important to the reading experience.

Fortunately for those of us who are heading into the world of self-publishing, Amazon has given us a primer.

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I Could Not Possibly Comment

Posted in Television, tagged , , , , , , , , on 11 Feb 2013| Leave a Comment »

Kurt R.A. GiambastianiThis week, I’m on “stay-cation,” which means we get to laze around the house for several days, go on outings, catch up on our reading, and watch a lot of movies. We started the week off by bingeing on the first season of a new series distributed by Netflix…yes, Netflix; they’re in the movie-making biz, now.

“House of Cards” stars Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright in the two lead roles, and when we started off, I was immediately hit with a sense of déjà vu. Something was familiar, but I couldn’t place it. But then a reporter speculated about the meaning behind a recent shift in power. When Frank Underwood (Spacey) drawled the answer, “You might very well think that; I, however, could not possibly comment,” it all clicked.

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Jet City Gridlock

Posted in Culture, Seattle, tagged , , , , , , , on 06 Feb 2013| 2 Comments »

Gossamer WheelSeattle is #10 in the nation for time wasted in commutes. To anyone who lives here, this is not a surprise.

Remember the old PC game, Sim-City? It was the game where the computer randomly generated a topography and your goal was to build a town and grow it into a city. Well, if you ever played that game, then you know that the hardest terrains to beat were those where water bisected the map, forcing you to build bridges to link up the different areas of town. Those bridges were a nightmare; they were always clogged with traffic, you could never build enough of the damned things, and of course, when Godzilla showed up, he scarfed them up like Seattleites eat biscotti at a coffee bar.

Well, dear friends, that scenario (sans Godzilla) is Seattle. (more…)

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Gentlemen, Start Your Engines

Posted in Books, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 05 Feb 2013| 36 Comments »

Stack of BooksNow that I’ve finished my foray into Shakespearean biographies and Elizabethan conspiracy theories, it’s time to get back to work.

Writing work, that is.

This project will be my tenth novel, and it will be a big departure from my previous books. Frankly, it’s got me scared pissless. But, as any great artist will tell you, if it doesn’t scare you, it’s not worth doing. (more…)

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British Kings, American Cash

Posted in Culture, Movies, Politics, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 04 Feb 2013| Leave a Comment »

Two interesting articles out of the UK’s Guardian newspaper crossed my desk this morning. One was about bones, and one was about money.

First, a team of archaeologists and historians in Britain have uncovered the bones of Richard III. For real. The bones tell an amazing and horrifying story of the last moments of the last Plantagenet king, and the last British king to die in battle. And, for those who have been wondering just how much Shakespeare’s anti-Plantagenet propaganda was fiction regarding the king’s twisted form, we can now genuinely say that physically, at least, his depiction was accurate.

The team, working in a car park in Leicester, lifted the horribly severed skull, the arm and leg bones, and then the severely curved spine. The bones tell us something of his life, of his death, and of his treatment after death. Much of it was not pretty.

The second article I found of interest was an interview with Robert Reich and Jacob Kornbluth about the documentary that swept the Sundance Festival and will soon be in wide distribution. Inequality for All is being called the economy’s equivalent of An Inconvenient Truth.

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