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Having a really good day?  Want to take the edge off all that happiness?  Try publishing on Amazon.  They leave a little bit of information here.  Hide a little bit there.  And, I believe, ignore the rest completely.  My wife fought her way through the process of getting her book cover accepted for download first.  Then between us, we got the rest of the book downloaded.  Believe it or not, although not perfect, the downloads for IPad, and IPhone and only the older Kindle e-reader came through with minor issues.  All of the newer Kindle devices justified completely on the left with no separation of paragraphs.  I use a Mac, so maybe that’s part of the problem.  After searching inside, outside, and upside down to find an editing option to make the necessary changes, I finally found a “HELP” desk to possibly get an answer.  They’ll get back to me, maybe in 24 hours.  I guess it beats waving cardboard advertising signs on street corners, but I bet those guys get paid more.  Toodles.

Oops!  My apologies to my wonderful editor–I misspelled her name on the post showing the planned cover for my Lady Katherine novel.  It is CINDY   VALLAR not ER.  I knew that, of course, sometimes when the fingers do the talking, the brain shuts down.  This is a great illustration of why writers need editors.  I’m still blushing, Cindy.

Dennis

The Lady Katherine novel I’ve been publishing here is finally back from the editor.   I intend to leave the posts available on this site until May 5th.  On that date, I will delete them.  As soon as I’ve finished  reworking the story with the editor’s suggestions, I intend to self publish it through Amazon, both ebook and paperback, and probably Smashwords.  On publication it will be titled The Rose:  A Lady Katherine novel.  I appreciate all of you who have followed, and still are following, Lady Katherine, and assure you there will be enough changes for you to enjoy the published book.

CAPTAIN KATE

After several months of a major rewrite of Captain Kate, post edit by an outside editor, I’ve finally put the last period on it.  Hallelujah!  But wait!  I now have to go back through and re-edit the post edit rewrite.  Will there ever be an end to it?  I’m also working on the rewritten manuscript with my critique group at HH in WVU, and that will probably take a few more months to complete.

When Captain Kate is finally ready, I’ll shop it around to agents and editors until after I’ve self published Lady Katherine and at least a second Lady Katherine.  They will contain spoilers for the Captain Kate series since Kate is the 16-year-old Lady Katherine.  Got all that?  I hope so, ‘cause I’m confused.

Fair winds and following seas.
LADY KATHERINE

After Basil finishes his snack, he will wing Eastward to my editor with the transcript of Lady Katherine.  Yes, something this important can only be delivered by air.  Should the little Lady be transferred overland, she might be easily waylaid.  By sea would be quite slow.  And through the ethernet?  Egad! the poor dear could be hacked.  That leaves me no other choice, then, but Basil.

When Lady Katherine is completed, after the edit, I intend to self publish her.  I’ll give you all a heads-up on that later.  After this, I envision at least two more in this series before I move on to Captain Kate–the 16-year-old Lady Katherine.

I need to put Captain Kate off for a while until I see how things work out in the Lady Katherine series.  It seems Lady Katherine is already exposing things about Kate’s past that I had never thought of before–things that can significantly change the future pirate queen’s background, therefore her future.

More updates will be coming, so stay tuned.

*****

MALL-CRAWL

Alas, winter is finally upon us with temperatures in the 40′s and rain today.  Wednesday and today Linda and I decided to move inside for our challenging exercise regime.  Wednesday morning we drove over to the Galleria, a Regional Mall that sits here in Roseville, and the largest one in the Sacramento Area.  The mall looks great after its major restoration due to an arson fire back in late 2010.  Today we went in the afternoon.  Our first stop on Wednesday was Cinnabon, today we stopped off at Milo’s Grille for a Gyro; both required for that extra energy needed to traverse the two story mall.  After taking sustenance, we managed to slug our way around both floors.  Some naysayers out there might point out that such high calorie meals are counterproductive to our Olympic expenditure of energy.   I, however,  say that without those necessary, and I might add, delicious, meals, there would have been no need to torture ourselves – almost a mile from car to car.  Whew!  I almost broke out in a sweat.

Anyone with a story of equally challenging physical achievement is invited to post.

Dennis -The pooped pirate.

TALK LIKE A PIRATE DAY

ARR! It be Talk Like A Pirate Day, today, mates.  All manner o’ pirate flags be flyin’ today, an pirates around the world’ll be party’n.  Mind ye if yer old enough ta drink the rum or man or woman enough ta drink the grog, there’ll be no poopin’ on the poop deck o’ Captain Kate’s ship.  She runs a tight ship, she does, an she’ll be unforgivin’ if’n ye sully up her belov’d West Wind–might even make ye kiss the gunner’s daughter, and that’d be a nasty way ta end yer day.  Pay yer reverence ta John and Mark, mates.  Party On!

Cap’n Big Al