MX Linux Forum

I have noticed that there are a few writers here in the MX Forums. If you are one, perhaps you'd be willing to share which publishers, tools, websites, etc. you like to use (and explain the benefits of each, as best you are able).

I count myself among those 'budding', really old, authors. :lipsrsealed: I am working on my first book, a children's storybook. The two new writing tools I hope to use (which are beyond the traditional Scrivener, Office, etc. ) are:

• My Storybook -https://www.mystorybook.com/

• Storybird -https://storybird.com/

I do not have any experience with either yet, aside from having read reviews and determined they look like good candidates to work with.

I used reedsy.com to write my book. The main thing that I loved in there is that I can drag the chapters around.

The publisher I am in contact with is one in the NL: bookscout.nl


Other than that: libreoffice :)

I write everything in google docs...then I hire a book designer who does the interior and cover using inDesign.

I do everything in LO, then PDF it. Send that to my (wonderful) layout person who also prepares the copy needed for publication.

LibreOffice and Plume Creator.

manyroads wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 9:51 am I have noticed that there are a few writers here in the MX Forums. If you are one, perhaps you'd be willing to share which publishers, tools, websites, etc. you like to use (and explain the benefits of each, as best you are able).

I count myself among those 'budding', really old, authors. :lipsrsealed: I am working on my first book, a children's storybook. The two new writing tools I hope to use (which are beyond the traditional Scrivener, Office, etc. ) are:

• My Storybook -https://www.mystorybook.com/

• Storybird -https://storybird.com/

I do not have any experience with either yet, aside from having read reviews and determined they look like good candidates to work with.

I've been writing for quite a few years. Published in a few magazines and anthologies. Also a devotional writer for years with a Christian ministry.
I have used the most basic tools like Google Docs and MS Office Online, to LibreOffice, which I used quite a bit, to more recently becoming a fan of Softmaker Office because of its excellent compatibility with MS Office files. Sigil and Calibre are useful for doing ebooks.
For fiction I like to keep track of characters and info with Manuskript.

I'm published too, but I didn't intentionally set out to be "a published author." Mostly just a few articles on a Christian website, and a couple that ended up in two magazines! And all I used was LibreOffice to write them, saved as pdfs, then sent them to friends.

Mind, I HAVE been published before in a poetry bundle. I used to write quite a lot back in the day some 18 years ago.

hello manyroads and hello everyone
I love to create documents too. unofficial and unpublished. Sharing cross-platform has meant pdf, rtf, now html. just the simple editors. At a time when we looked into publishing .. kindle publishing presented as interesting. Not done that yet.

hi artim. You are on a thresh-hold of another pyramid regular. In advance of Your next post we say congratulations! A toast to Your next hundred (no alcohol for the under-age.) Thanks for contributing.

Started writing technical equipment manuals in 1963 with a fountain pen, the originals were proofread, then typed on to skins for offset printing.
These days use Libre Office or Lyx. Lyx has the advantage of doing the layout for you. Both Lyx and Libre Office provide for chapters to be edited
and moved individually.

The main tools I use to create my stories.

Fountain pen
LibreOffice Writer
writer2epub
Calibre
LibreOffice Draw / GIMP
Recorder
Audacity
Normalize-audio
SoundConverter
mp3gain

Gordon Cooper wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 3:38 pm Started writing technical equipment manuals in 1963 with a fountain pen,

I am SO glad that most of the writing these days is done on computers. I have never been able to write for longer periods of time and even shorter ones now just hurt too much.

Yay for keyboards as I can use those quite nicely still. Be it with breaks :)

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 3:42 pm

I am SO glad that most of the writing these days is done on computers. I have never been able to write for longer periods of time and even shorter ones now just hurt too much.

Yay for keyboards as I can use those quite nicely still. Be it with breaks :)

I second that. Computers have been liberating for me regarding writing. Though I have written longhand, I hate to do so and avoid it whenever possible :)

I graduated from fountain pen to typewriter, much to the joy of Joanna who typed the printing skins. At least she could read my drafts now.

@kbd & @eadwine rose, I can hardly read my own handwriting... I agree, hooray for keyboards. On another note @eadwine rose have you tried voice to text tools to help when you hurt from typing? Here's a bit on the topic... I'm think there are people here willing to help you, if you are interested.

https://www.linuxlinks.com/best-free-li ... -software/

I have tried it, on my Android phone it works rather nicely. At least I can do enough to get the writing done, but it is definitely something to keep in mind. However with the splints it does make a difference :)

@eadwine rose Here's more from the Debian world on what they have ging on.
https://blends.debian.org/accessibility ... ecognition

@Eadwine Rose and manyroads. I agree, voice to text is worth trying. I used it for a while when working with XP and was writing voice overs to be read by a 'professional voice' when we were making audio-visuals for training. It can be a bit frustrating at the start. many mistakes and umms.. but these are easily fixed in an editor.

Thanks Manyroads.

If someone is interested in trying all that in MX, be my guest. For now I am just really happy my system runs reliably so I am not going to install too much to try out when I don't yet really need it

I worked with a patent lawyer who used a text to speech application for patent submissions and this was several years ago.

I like writing too, mostly short stories and essays. I use LibreOffice and have tried many other tools like pluma creator and the likes and I'd recommend bibisco http://www.bibisco.com/ One thing that worth using is a proofreading tool, I use this one https://languagetool.org/ which you can also install in LO as an add-on and https://www.gingersoftware.com/ for when checking on mistakes. Here's a link I bookmarked quite a while reviewing some online tools for writers https://writingcooperative.com/20-fanta ... abffa293b5 By the way, hand writing is a powerful tool when needing inspiration. I write in my computer but also keep a notebook and a pencil in my bag wherever I go just in case "mi musa" comes and try to hand write as often as possible.

Thanks for that extension

https://languagetool.org/#libreoffice

Just added it to LO :)

After install: tools - language tool - options

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:09 pm Thanks for that extension

https://languagetool.org/#libreoffice

Just added it to LO :)

You're welcome!

Turns out I write rather old fashioned according to the thing.. I wonder how the publisher is going to react to that one

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:15 pm Turns out I write rather old fashioned according to the thing.. I wonder how the publisher is going to react to that one

Actually, now that I think of it I hand write my stories more often than not, I don't know maybe it's because I started my journey as a writer (although I've been only published once in a short stories compilation some years ago, three of my stories are in that book ) using a paper and a pencil and to be honest I don't know but to me things comes more naturally that way than when in front of the pc.

Uhm, you misunderstand. I will give them a digital file

I meant: I use difficult words for things that could be said simpler.


To add, I know why this is: I was raised rather old fashioned (my dad is 80, my gran on mom's side is 93 ), and as such my choice of words in Dutch are a generation up from my standard age group.

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:30 pm Uhm, you misunderstand. I will give them a digital file

I meant: I use difficult words for things that could be said simpler.


To add, I know why this is: I was raised rather old fashioned (my dad is 80, my gran on mom's side is 93 ), and as such my choice of words in Dutch are a generation up from my standard age group.

Oh..you were talking about your writing style. What do write by the way? If I may ask. I write "fantastic reality" (at least this what they call it in spanish, "realidad fantastica") or I try to. This is when you mix real facts with fantasy, adding some absurdity and sarcasm to the most trivial things so they become something more like a fun-sad story. My favourite author is Edgar A. Poe who was one of the first in doing this. In spanish, the late authors Gabriel G. Marquez, Horacio Quiroga and Julio Cortazar were also writers who used this style. Luis B. Garcia uses this style too as well as many others.

Moltke wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:58 pmI write "fantastic reality" (at least this what they call it in spanish, "realidad fantastica") or I try to. This is when you mix real facts with fantasy, adding some absurdity and sarcasm to the most trivial things so they become something more like a fun-sad story. My favourite author is Edgar A. Poe who was one of the first in doing this. In spanish, the late authors Gabriel G. Marquez, Horacio Quiroga and Julio Cortazar were also writers who used this style. Luis B. Garcia uses this style too as well as many others.

This is called magic realism or magical realism in English. I've enjoyed the magic realism of Haruki Murakami more than somewhat.

I am a retired university professor and laboratory researcher in the area of physiology. My department was Mac oriented and I originally did my text writing on WriteNow. That was a well-designed, simple word processor!

In those old days creating accurate and visually appealing graphs (figures) was a problem. These days word, statistical and graphics programs are abundant.

That said, there are two points I want to make with this post. First, crucial to organization and saving time was bibliographic management software (BMS). The first program I used was EndNote, which in the beginning was Mac only. I mention BMS because The Dolphin & Mrs. Oracle introduce Zotero in THIS YouTube video.

Second, in the latter stages of my career I organized my lab notebook with Circus Ponies NoteBook, which was Mac only and, sadly, closed its doors Jan 2016 (it works up to Sierra). In brief, NoteBook was a super outliner that allowed you to store, organize, arrange, and manage information and files. Links could be made from one entry in the notebook to another. Text was automatically placed in an index. Organizing your thoughts, procedures, and data in NoteBook made the transition to a word processor much easier. I mention Circus Ponies NoteBook because I don't know of anything close in Linux, which is too bad.

Moltke wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:58 pm Oh..you were talking about your writing style. What do write by the way? If I may ask. I write "fantastic reality" (at least this what they call it in spanish, "realidad fantastica") or I try to. This is when you mix real facts with fantasy, adding some absurdity and sarcasm to the most trivial things so they become something more like a fun-sad story. My favourite author is Edgar A. Poe who was one of the first in doing this. In spanish, the late authors Gabriel G. Marquez, Horacio Quiroga and Julio Cortazar were also writers who used this style. Luis B. Garcia uses this style too as well as many others.

This particular one is non fiction. They are things that actually happened to me at work. Of course some events were merged together because one small thing isn't interesting enough to make a chapter out of, and names were obviously changed. But the things I have written are real events.

The last time I wrote a novel was a fantasy novel about a boy who ran away and met a dragon. That one never got finished, and I should have this somewhere but no idea where hahaha.

And then back in the day mostly poetry as it was an easy way to cope with what I was going through in my life.

Writing has always been one of my hobbies, and back when Nanowrimo happened I figured: hey.. you have wanted to for so long, GIT!

BitJam wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 9:38 pm This is called magic realism or magical realism in English. I've enjoyed the magic realism of Haruki Murakami more than somewhat.

Murakami is fab...you might also like George Saunders

For me, magical realism has the same problem that fantasy does: it destroys the challenge of plot construction that distinguishes high-quality writing. At any point where s/he does not know what to do, the author can simply invoke a deus ex machina and--bingo, all done!

@Eadwine Rose, I had never heard of Nanwrimo. For others who have not, here's a link to their site: https://nanowrimo.org/

Jerry3904 wrote: Mon Dec 31, 2018 8:40 am For me, magical realism has the same problem that fantasy does: it destroys the challenge of plot construction that distinguishes high-quality writing. At any point where s/he does not know what to do, the author can simply invoke a deus ex machina and--bingo, all done!

I don't know exactly what you mean but I think you're wrong or maybe you've only read some authors who do this. Can you give an example of this? I mean name some story/novel by some author who do this. Good writers, the good ones; Salman Rushdie, read "the ground beneath her feet" by him, is such a great story, you'll love it. Rudyard Kipling, read "the phantom rickshaw and other tales by him, you won't regret it. Gabriel G. Marquez, read "On love and other demons (del amor y otros demonios)" my favourite novel by him. Edgar A. Poe, read "the angel of the odd", you'll have a good laugh. None of these authors ever invoked a "deus ex machina" to solve any unsolvable plot. Magical Realism isn't about happy or sad endings since they dont write for the ending but for the plot itself; the reader's journey through their story. Well, at least that's how I see it but you know...there's no accounting for taste.

Eadwine Rose wrote: Mon Dec 31, 2018 6:51 am

Moltke wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:58 pm Oh..you were talking about your writing style. What do write by the way? If I may ask. I write "fantastic reality" (at least this what they call it in spanish, "realidad fantastica") or I try to. This is when you mix real facts with fantasy, adding some absurdity and sarcasm to the most trivial things so they become something more like a fun-sad story. My favourite author is Edgar A. Poe who was one of the first in doing this. In spanish, the late authors Gabriel G. Marquez, Horacio Quiroga and Julio Cortazar were also writers who used this style. Luis B. Garcia uses this style too as well as many others.

This particular one is non fiction. They are things that actually happened to me at work. Of course some events were merged together because one small thing isn't interesting enough to make a chapter out of, and names were obviously changed. But the things I have written are real events.

The last time I wrote a novel was a fantasy novel about a boy who ran away and met a dragon. That one never got finished, and I should have this somewhere but no idea where hahaha.

And then back in the day mostly poetry as it was an easy way to cope with what I was going through in my life.

Writing has always been one of my hobbies, and back when Nanowrimo happened I figured: hey.. you have wanted to for so long, GIT!

I see. More like "chronicles"?

BitJam wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 9:38 pm

Moltke wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 6:58 pmI write "fantastic reality" (at least this what they call it in spanish, "realidad fantastica") or I try to. This is when you mix real facts with fantasy, adding some absurdity and sarcasm to the most trivial things so they become something more like a fun-sad story. My favourite author is Edgar A. Poe who was one of the first in doing this. In spanish, the late authors Gabriel G. Marquez, Horacio Quiroga and Julio Cortazar were also writers who used this style. Luis B. Garcia uses this style too as well as many others.

This is called magic realism or magical realism in English. I've enjoyed the magic realism of Haruki Murakami more than somewhat.

Thanks for the clarification! I haven't read Murakami but I will :) By the way, here's a link listing and reviewing some good online communities for writers https://nybookeditors.com/2015/11/11-to ... n-and-why/

manyroads wrote: Mon Dec 31, 2018 9:53 am @Eadwine Rose, I had never heard of Nanwrimo. For others who have not, here's a link to their site: https://nanowrimo.org/

Wow.. really??

Well.. good thing to know then, for the 2019 Nano :)

I don't know exactly what you mean but I think you're wrong or maybe you've only read some authors who do this. Can you give an example of this? I mean name some story/novel by some author who do this. Good writers, the good ones; Salman Rushdie, read "the ground beneath her feet" by him, is such a great story, you'll love it. Rudyard Kipling, read "the phantom rickshaw and other tales by him, you won't regret it. Gabriel G. Marquez, read "On love and other demons (del amor y otros demonios)" my favourite novel by him. Edgar A. Poe, read "the angel of the odd", you'll have a good laugh. None of these authors ever invoked a "deus ex machina" to solve any unsolvable plot. Magical Realism isn't about happy or sad endings since they dont write for the ending but for the plot itself; the reader's journey through their story. Well, at least that's how I see it but you know...there's no accounting for taste.

I love your amazing assumption that I have not read those and, if I would just do it, I would of course agree with you ...

Gordon Cooper wrote: Sun Dec 30, 2018 3:38 pm These days use Libre Office or Lyx. Lyx has the advantage of doing the layout for you. Both Lyx and Libre Office provide for chapters to be edited
and moved individually.

+1 used LyX for writing a thesis 15 years ago, was great... It improved a lot since. Used pybliographer for bibliography, works well with LyX (when KDE, I think it was Kbibtex). Advantage of LyX, you don't need to know Latex, or care about formating, just write, you can change format for different publishers easily (maybe a bit not so, when you need to use some special format of footnotes like say European universities would expect, so need to install some extra latex packages and adjust a bit in Latex). Anyway, the job was done easier than OO or LO then, especially when docs get longer, it still doesn't hang...

I heard people who need to use math formulas praising Texmacs too.

Jerry3904 wrote: Mon Dec 31, 2018 10:24 am

I don't know exactly what you mean but I think you're wrong or maybe you've only read some authors who do this. Can you give an example of this? I mean name some story/novel by some author who do this. Good writers, the good ones; Salman Rushdie, read "the ground beneath her feet" by him, is such a great story, you'll love it. Rudyard Kipling, read "the phantom rickshaw and other tales by him, you won't regret it. Gabriel G. Marquez, read "On love and other demons (del amor y otros demonios)" my favourite novel by him. Edgar A. Poe, read "the angel of the odd", you'll have a good laugh. None of these authors ever invoked a "deus ex machina" to solve any unsolvable plot. Magical Realism isn't about happy or sad endings since they dont write for the ending but for the plot itself; the reader's journey through their story. Well, at least that's how I see it but you know...there's no accounting for taste.

I love your amazing assumption that I have not read those and, if I would just do it, I would of course agree with you ...

Well, I didn't assume you hadn't read them I was simply suggesting that you did but if you have already read them then why do you say that the magical realism abuses of the "deus ex machina"? And just for the record I'm not trying to be controversial or anything of that sort, I'm just curious in knowing your reasons, maybe I'm the one who's not seeing the obvious and I'd like to know thus improving my understanding of this writing style. Besides, that's the great thing about literature; anyone can have their own opinions and everyone can be wrong/right. Like I said, there's no accounting for taste. :)

Cheers!

Jerry3904 wrote: Mon Dec 31, 2018 8:40 am For me, magical realism has the same problem that fantasy does: it destroys the challenge of plot construction that distinguishes high-quality writing. At any point where s/he does not know what to do, the author can simply invoke a deus ex machina and--bingo, all done!

That's the thing I liked about Robert E. Howard's Conan stories. He said his barbarian was too dumb to figure things out so he had to fight his way out of bad situations :) Just brute strength, no deus ex machina.

I'm currently reading a novel where they use cows to power their "hyperdrive." A big starship can cross the galaxy in days on the power of 500 cows. They took the cow that jumped over the Moon and, by selective breeding, went from a short hop to much longer trips. This is okay with me because I know it's a farce, but I don't much like stories where they try to do such fantastic things non-farcically.

I understand that fantasy writers and readers have their own kind of "code" for what kind of magic is acceptable in each particular fantastic universe, and that the writers are expected to stay within those rules, so it's not really a case of laziness in that sense that allows them to get the hero out of trouble with the wave of a hand. Still, I prefer to read stories where the author is constrained by the known and physically possible forces of nature. In other words, I like science fiction and resent that it's categorized with fantasy.

I agree with you, Jerry. There is a certain laziness in using magic instead of realism. But if you're in that space where writers and readers agree on the rules, then it's all right. Just, please, keep it in there.-)

I do believe you folks seem to be dancing "a little bit" around that age old question of "how many angels can stand on the head of pin". Magic, realism, magical realism, fantasy, fiction, non-fiction, drama, humor and many many more are all legitimate perspectives in literature. As for having a preference, well you and I as well as everyone else get to like what they like.

But that's just my opinion... and I am quite certain "the older I become, the more irrelevant I am."

Frohes neues Jahr ~ próspero año ~ bonne année ~ szczęśliwego Nowego Roku ~ Happy New Year

But that's just my opinion... and I am quite certain "the older I become, the more irrelevant I am."

Love that line manyroads. I am also disappearing in the eyes of those younger.

The older I get the more I get noticed.. probably because the older I get the more bling gets added to my body hahahah

Actually when I am out with my partner we often hear "what a cute couple". I take it to mean we are old. In reality she is the cute one at 5 feet tall and 100 lbs, dressed to perfection. Maybe I should write an article about getting old in a society that values youth.
(I threw that in to stay on topic.

@richb I think everyone values being young. In my opinion,it's also fine being old; since, the option is being dead.

I just thought I'd through in a happy thought for 2019...

Once or twice, a few years ago I did a lot of writing. Now with the passing years, progress in anything is much slower. Have loaded up to Dropbox a few factual
stories written over 20 years ago, memories of a couple of years spent on a remote and lightly volcanic Pacific Island weather station.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6br5ler7q29jn ... s.pdf?dl=0

*whispers* I just sent the manuscript off to the publisher I have been in contact with. Wait and see if they'll accept it.



NERVOUS!!

Eadwine Rose wrote: Fri Jan 11, 2019 8:18 am *whispers* I just sent the manuscript off to the publisher I have been in contact with. Wait and see if they'll accept it.



NERVOUS!!

Eadwine Rose wrote: Fri Jan 11, 2019 8:18 am *whispers* I just sent the manuscript off to the publisher I have been in contact with. Wait and see if they'll accept it.



NERVOUS!!

Good luck Eadwine!

succes, ER

Thanks guys!

Just heard from the publisher, the first impression of my manuscript has been positive, so they are going to go through the manuscript more thoroughly now.

I have been invited to an info afternoon next week Wednesday to see what they are all about. I can take a look at the way they work, I can ask questions that I might have.

At that time I will also hear whether they are going to work with me or not.

My book has made it through the initial screening!

That is great!

Awesome news Eadwine!

Thanks :)

It's scary and exciting *giggle* Wait and see what happens. Just a wee less than 1.5 weeks worth of waiting

Great news Eadwine!

Thanks! I'll keep you guys posted of course.

If they back out after all I can always still self publish, but hey.. having a publisher helping you out isn't a bad thing at all!

I'm not a writer :( although I write my biggest and funniest life events and story's of it

ConfusedPanda wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 8:12 am I'm not a writer :( although I write my biggest and funniest life events and story's of it

Sounds like a writer to me :)

Good news! I am going to get published.

I have to take a few errors out of the manuscript of course, and they're going to be doing back and forths with me till it's all perfect. But it is gonna happen :D So happy. Got REALLY awesome critiques. :D

When on the market let us know. If in English I will buy it. Heck I will buy it if it is Swahili!

LMAO!!!!

I will send you a pm

Eadwine Rose wrote: Wed Jan 30, 2019 2:40 pm Good news! I am going to get published.

I have to take a few errors out of the manuscript of course, and they're going to be doing back and forths with me till it's all perfect. But it is gonna happen :D So happy. Got REALLY awesome critiques. :D

Excellent news!
I'm expecting a signed copy.

LOL!! When I have to buy all the books myself I am going to be piss poor by the end of it hahaha!

Congratulations!!

Thanks :)

Way to go, ER. An actual book, with paper and everything. Can you give us a sneak peak at the cover image or anything?

That's wonderful Eadwine! Great job!

Thanks guys!!

Once there actually IS a cover, sure I will show it :) It is now in the "let's correct the few mistakes that are in there still" stage. I will get two people assigned to me whom I can approach if I have questions or whatever. Meanwhile I can start looking around on what I want to do with the cover. The publisher will help out with that as well.

Sooo awesome, ER!

Thanks Paul!!

Wish you continued success!

I wonder who will play you when the movie comes out?

Sandra Bullock would be nice (but the one before the face adaptations ).

Just sent off the 2nd version of the manuscript. All their comments have been taken to heart. Errors have been taken out, stupid Dutch language is hard with its pulled together words and such.

Fingers crossed that this one is going to get approved!!

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sat Feb 16, 2019 2:49 pm Just sent off the 2nd version of the manuscript. All their comments have been taken to heart. Errors have been taken out, stupid Dutch language is hard with its pulled together words and such.

Fingers crossed that this one is going to get approved!!

So, how do you change the "middle" of a word?

Hmm how do you mean?

Over here words are pulledtogether like that in sentences. But it depends whether or not they should be, and that is what is hard to figure out. English is easier for me than that factor in Dutch.

Thank goodness for google

Dutch language problems. You bring back some memories Eadwine. Some years ago I was preparing a training course on a complex equipment supplied by Philips.
The drawings were all In Dutch with many words strung together. Joanna, one of our team came from Holland and she could not help us much with words 20-30
letters in length. Your German neighbours do the same, particularly with technical wording, and in both cases, a normal translating dictionary is of little help.

Hahaha yep, exactly that!! Trust me.. it is annoying for us too. WHEN do you pull together, and when not.

You run the risk of changing the meaning of a word completely if you're not careful!

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sat Feb 16, 2019 3:15 pm Hmm how do you mean?

Over here words are pulledtogether like that in sentences. But it depends whether or not they should be, and that is what is hard to figure out. English is easier for me than that factor in Dutch.

Thank goodness for google

I meant when you pull words together to make a big word, then there's something wrong with it and you have to change something in the middle. But now I find out that you don't always pull them together and you have to decide whether it's a pull-together time or not ... Never mind. I'm getting a headache.-)

Roughly. I just write things down completely differently when in doubt. *Giggle*

Eadwine Rose wrote: Wed Jan 30, 2019 2:40 pm Good news! I am going to get published.

I have to take a few errors out of the manuscript of course, and they're going to be doing back and forths with me till it's all perfect. But it is gonna happen :D So happy. Got REALLY awesome critiques. :D

EXCELLENT!

Wonderful news. Be sure not to add any of those long long words when you do the corrections.

Thanks guys!

Gordon, haha I am sorry but I HAVE to. Words that can be joined according to Dutch spelling/grammar regulations SHOULD be joined, otherwise they are simply incorrect. And I have to deliver a manuscript without errors.


I wish it were different. Those stupid words (when do you and when don't you) took the most time to correct. I also had " " errors (mostly where goes the comma, where goes the period. IS there a period?), but at least I made the same error consistently so that was sorted with an easy find-replace *giggle*

Eadwine Rose - Periods and commas give me problems too. Usually insert a comma where a period should be used. making the sentences too darned long.
We were taught never to start a new sentence with 'And' or 'But' , so commas were used, when really a new sentence should be used. It was OK to start
with 'Also' but not with 'And'. Of course rules like this will vary with the language used. English has some odd conventions and rules, I am never sure
when (if ever) to use a semi-colon, so I tend to avoid them.

Yeah.. I had semi-colons in my text, I reworded so those are now gone since you rarely see those in a book.

Too long sentences, yep.. when reading through I was critical. You can have short ones, that is ok. So I was critical of myself and neatened that to be more even. :)

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 3:13 pm Yeah.. I had semi-colons in my text, I reworded so those are now gone since you rarely see those in a book.

You should use a semi-colon or full-stop (US period LOL) not a comma here

LOL!

BTW: more on semicolons here: Was Kurt Vonnegut Right to Hate Semicolons?

Also:

Strunk &White wrote: Do not join independent clauses by a comma.

If two or more clauses, grammatically complete and not joined by a conjunction, are to form a single compound sentence, the proper mark of punctuation is a semicolon.

anticapitalista wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 3:31 pm

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 3:13 pm Yeah.. I had semi-colons in my text, I reworded so those are now gone since you rarely see those in a book.

You should use a semi-colon or full-stop (US period LOL) not a comma here

You should see my messages on facebook.

those look rughly like taht

I am a lazy chirp.

I often replace a semi-colon with a common for a colloquial style, but never in formal writing.

Eadwine Rose wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 4:18 pm You should see my messages on facebook.

those look rughly like taht

I am a lazy chirp.

Mind.. my chat messages.. NOT the timeline updates.. when I see an error I will correct it *giggle*

On my copy; I am hoping to receive when published; I will not be able to read it anyway; however if I do a Google translate on a word; what are the chances I will get the right English translation? By the way I never use semi-colons.

NOT a clue.. it really depends on the word haha.

you might want to try OCR or something and see what that good translator that we found not too long ago.. what was the name, can make sense out of it.


As far as your copy, we will sort it out via PM and paypal, pretty sure that will work :)

Deepl can translate most of the European languages. Dutch is included.

Deepl!

I was thinking beebl or something hahaha. That is the one indeed. I found its translations quite the quality.

Yes, that is it. Used Deepl for a while last year - in fact translating Dutch to English - but I could not register as a paying user. Their administration was very limited in
the countries they would accept. New Zealand, a couple of smallish islands in the South Pacific, was outside their span of interest.

Just have to go squeeeeeee!

The cover has now been finalized (after a number of design pointers from yours truly ) and tomorrow morning they are going to request the first printed version of the book for yours truly.

Woopwoop!!

Exciting! What is the title (with English translation please)?
Come to think of it I am writer too. I have written a few patents. Well before the lawyers got hold of them. I guess that is not real writing after all.

The home care, as a helper ánd as a client,
hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome changed my life



And to me that is real writing too.

Woopwoop, the first copy has been printed, it has been approved by them and it is now on its way to me.


Of course if I find something that is not right I will let them know about it. I am vocal like that. Basically made them turn the whole back design around because it wasn't good enough in my eyes. They still keep complimenting me, so I think I am not TOO bad hahaha.


Almost threw the whole dealie in the bin actually.. I got a case of terrible cold feet this past Tuesday, started doubting everything, thank goodness was smart enough to mail them with my thoughts and fears. Took a half hour phone call from them to make me see reason that the book IS good enough, and that I DID put enough effort in.


I am kind of a bit too much a perfectionist with these things. *sigh*

You are good at being vocal? LOL I did not know that. I am glad you persevered and did not back out. Expecting your book to eventually be translated into 20 languages,

LOL Yes. I am very well capable to tell people like it is. On paper.

IRL though, I have more issues, especially with authority figures. Learning though, learning!

Eadwine Rose wrote: Thu Feb 28, 2019 7:21 am LOL Yes. I am very well capable to tell people like it is. On paper.

IRL though, I have more issues, especially with authority figures. Learning though, learning!

From my experience you should never stop learning. And as I have grown older, and I hope wiser, more confident in standing up to authority when appropriate. But even at my age it is still a learning process.

“It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts.” ―John Wooden

“The education of a man is never completed until he dies.” – Robert E. Lee

Indeed true quotes. I have been told the same by some of my elderly clients back then. :)

Did you just imply I was elderly?

Way to change what I said :P

Eadwine Rose wrote: Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:29 am Way to change what I said :P

One of my talents.

Hehe.. their comments were mostly like: we're never too old to learn, I am even learning something new from you.

:)

Eadwine Rose wrote: Thu Feb 28, 2019 6:47 am I got a case of terrible cold feet this past Tuesday, started doubting everything, thank goodness was smart enough to mail them with my thoughts and fears. Took a half hour phone call from them to make me see reason that the book IS good enough, and that I DID put enough effort in.

Anne Lamott (author of "Bird by Bird"...a wonderful book about writing) says, "Perfection is the enemy of the people."

When it comes to writing, I find that it is a daily battle. I can laugh about it when I'm not suffering in its icy grip.

As an aspiring novelist, I personally cannot really answer this question, because I have never progressed beyond the stage of simply writing copious notes for myself on the characters, settings and plot.

I suppose I can give one possibly useful tip. Some years ago, I discovered--through what, I don't remember--a "work in progress notebook" organizer by an author named Jeannie Ruesch. (http://jeannieruesch.com/product-catego ... -notebook/ ) She made it available in either book form or a computer file; I bought the file version. I've never even gotten around to using it yet, but it could be of interest to other writers.

Paul.. wrote: Thu Feb 28, 2019 9:17 am Anne Lamott (author of "Bird by Bird"...a wonderful book about writing) says, "Perfection is the enemy of the people."

When it comes to writing, I find that it is a daily battle. I can laugh about it when I'm not suffering in its icy grip.

Just imagine me correcting the thing.... gaaah!


I can seriously tell you I was tired of reading the book after run nr 6

Sounds like things are moving along very well Eadwine!
Getting cold feet is not unusual :)

That is what the publisher person also told me hahah. A lot of people get that. I was floating in my bed, sweating like mad, half and half drifting to a panic.

But.. I am trying to let that go. It pops up every now and then.. the "yeah but" thinking.


Breathe in breathe out, let it go.

My first book took me ten years to get right...in between work gigs, finding an editor, rewrites...it's about my ten years as a herring fisherman when I was a kid in the 1970s..."Door in Dark Water" on Amazon...

Git outta town.. we can buy it in a Dutch webshop as well :D

https://www.bol.com/nl/p/door-in-dark-w ... 030010224/

That's amazing...what the heck? That's too funny...the gods of herring are watching over me.

That's awesome haha!