My friend Alejandra gave me a new project to work on last week. I had the challenge of rebinding a copy of Much Ado About Nothing that was published in 1901! This frail little book had the covers falling off and half the signatures falling out, and it was in serious...
The Marbling Experiment
I wish I had more photos to show, but honestly, it was so messy I didn't dare pick up my phone! I tried marbling some paper over the weekend, and I picked two different ways: using shaving cream, and using cornstarch. I treated some paper with alum before starting on...
My first handbound book
I've created a number of notepads and sketch books with blank pages, and I've re-bound a few second-hand books, but this is my first proper book - one that I typeset myself, printed myself, and bound myself. I think the end result is pretty good! The paper on the...
Would you like to choose what I write?
Okay! There's a few things to talk about, so let's get stuck in. I completed a book, and sent it out for beta-reading. The question now is what do I do once I get feedback. See, I've been staring at this book for hours over the last few weeks. True to the creative...
Has my Book been Pirated?
Piracy is still a big issue for ebooks, in spite of the fact that DRM has been optional for a while now on Amazon (the only platform that counts*). I'm still of the opinion that it's basically irrelevant - you can't control it, can't prevent it, and worrying about it...
Who You Write For
I watched a video on Youtube today from the PBS Game/Show channel about crowdfunding, and the obligations of creators to the consumers of what they create. Crowdfunding causes users to be invested in the successful creation of media. The rise of Patreon.com and other...
Lying Down with Dogs
It is now 8am in Vancouver, and I think I've rewritten chunks of this post at least three times. Who's been keeping up with the shenanigans going on in the Hugos? The five second summary is as follows: a couple of straight white dudes took umbrage at the fact that,...
More about Pay to Play Publishers
A while back, I wrote about Tate Publishing, a subsidy publisher that had been in the news as a result of some... rather callous business practices. I think it's a good time to revisit publishers like these in light of a recent comment on that post. (For the...
Exotic Ebook Formatting
You may have noticed that I finally got my act together and cleaned up the website. My friend Fay was nice enough to lend me one of her themes! I did some edits on it, and I think it came out okay. Being a web designer, my site is always a work in progress. Anyway -...
Your ebooks can track you
As you may know, I'm sometimes a web developer as well as being a writer/swordfighter. Being a dev means knowing all kinds of random stuff about what makes the Internet tick, and incidentally, it also lets me understand a few things about ebooks. Ebooks can track the...
Free and Useful Apps and Services for Authors
So this came up while I was chatting to a couple of writer-inclined friends, so I thought I'd put together a list of some useful free and not so free apps that I use and have used in the past. This is specifically for writers and authors - enjoy! Workflowy This is...
An Author’s Life, or Why I will Never Do a Kickstarter
So... let's talk about the business of writing. It's definitely a business, unless you're writing and posting your stuff for free online. (Or just using it as parrot cage lining.) Being a professional writer is a tough gig. It's hard to convince readers that your work...