Storybook Perfect

Always quirky, sometimes sweet speculative fiction

Category: Hmmm This Could Work (Page 1 of 2)

A place for ideas and spitballing.

Logo Reveal!

April 17, 2016 / / 0 Comments

Now that Charming is out in Leading Edge, and The Troll’s Toll is getting close to release I thought it was time to look into getting a logo for the Retailored Fairy Tales series which they are both a part of.

The Retailored Fairy Tales series is a world where a lot of my stories happen, a world where fairy tale happenings are every day occurrences, though like with real life, the happy ending isn’t assured and more is happening behind the scenes than in your usual fairy tales.

The upcoming releases of Glass Bones (in Ink and Locket‘s upcoming LGBT Warriors Anthology) and Groundskeeper (in Stupefying Stories) also take place in this world, as well as the novella I recently completed, Glass Slippers, about how the glass slippers actually came to be on Cinderella’s feet. And don’t forget the several sequels to Charming!

With so much coming out I thought it a good idea to get them all under a nice little umbrella together, so people could know they were all in the same fun universe.

So without further ado:

RFT

What do you think? Are you looking forward to any particular Retailored Fairy Tales? I’d love to hear from you.

Who Doesn’t Love Free Books?

September 25, 2014 / / 0 Comments
Free at last!

Free at last!

Seriously, is there anyone out there who doesn’t love free books?

Well, you can now get your copy of 18 (containing my short story Nightfall) for free!

Grab it from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Inktera, or Scribd now.

Don’t forget there’s also a whole range of free short stories by me on my Free Fiction page here.

My First Interview

May 24, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Check out my first interview over at No Shovels Here!

18 – The Vision Writers Anthology

May 9, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Long-time readers will be familiar with the fact I’m a member and Vice-President of a fantastic critique group: Vision Writers.

18visionVision Writers celebrates its eighteenth anniversary this September, and current president Belinda thought it would be a smashing idea for the current generation of the group to make an anthology. Our original intent was to release a little closer to the anniversary in September, but at the meeting on Sunday we found the ebook version was good to go so – SURPRISE – you can go buy it now!

All of the stories have been critiqued by the whole group at least twice, so aren’t just the product of the imaginations of group members, but the toil of our critiquing and our members taking on board the feedback and actioning it(more on that in an upcoming post where I’ll give you a chance to check out how dramatically my own story Nightfall changed throughout the process).

And I’m going to issue a challenge to all readers of the anthology: one of our members is sweet sixteen. Her piece is in here with everyone else’s. I GUARANTEE you won’t guess which one is hers. Yes. Guarantee. I’m going for that strong a word.

Obviously I’m totally biased as to the awesomeness of this anthology, so go check it out on Amazon and peek inside. The ‘look inside’ function on Amazon will let you see the first story and a little bit of the second and I’m confident you won’t be able to stop yourself there.

Doesn’t This Sound Fun

January 26, 2014 / / 0 Comments

One of my critique group buddies shared some info from a writing magazine she’s subscribed to with me and that’s how I came across Found Fiction.

The idea is a story or poem is slipped in an envelope marked ‘read me’ and left places. Any place, a bus stop, a cafe, inside a book at a bookstore. Some one will spot it and (assuming they don’t watch too many horror movies where this sort of thing doesn’t end well) they open it and read it. Ideally they will then tweet or post about it on Facebook so Found Fiction know their fun is spreading.

Of course I love the idea. I’m already looking into how to become a distributor and certainly wouldn’t mind getting a story or two dropped in random places around the world either.

I’d love to drop a slew of Found Fiction around at writers’ festivals (like BWF and BBWF) that I go to this year, and trust me, even though my vertigo is back and I have hardly managed to walk all week (oh and my doctor says no driving >:( ) I’ll still find ways to get some fiction into new hands.

If you’d like to check them out yourself you can find Found Fiction on Facebook and Twitter.

Let’s Make It BIG!

January 7, 2014 / / 0 Comments
Hunting the web for a cool picture of the Australian flag, totally found this instead and had to share

Hunting the web for a cool picture of the Australian flag for this post, totally found this instead and had to share

This is a call out to all my lovely readers. I want to share The Australian Speculative Fiction Authors Challenge with as many people as possible. I want to challenge everyone!

So please, share it in your online spaces, blogs, Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter whatever you have. EVERYTHING you have!

I really want to see how many people we can get enjoying the challenge.

Click to tweet: The Australian Speculative Fiction Authors #ReadingChallenge http://wp.me/P2f5ib-kV I challenge you!


Share This Challenge on Facebook

Copy and paste this link to share on other platforms: https://www.storybookperfect.com/the-aussie-spec-fic-author-challenge-2014/

Also, if there is anyone with more talent in graphic design than I who would like to spiff up the button for the challenge you’re definitely welcome to – my photoshop talents are… hmmm how to put this nicely… Non existent.

20,000 Words To Go

November 26, 2013 / / 2 Comments

So. After such a killer start my NaNo unraveled pretty severely. Cars broke down, children got sick, more days at work and much longer shifts (which were added to even more by having to bus it to work instead of just taking the car), and an epic amount of effort was put into finding a daycare for Xander to attend for two days because no one else could work those shifts at work (oh the joys of console launches) but our current daycare didn’t have those days available.

I barely touched my computer for two weeks. You don’t even want to imagine what my two email accounts look like. No really. You’d think I’d been spam bombed, but that’s just what an inbox looks like when you haven’t opened it for twelve days.

So after a killer start to NaNo, I’m now 20,000 words behind. And yet, still not gonna give up.

I'll be channeling this guy (and yes I know I've used this image five time before, that just how awesome it is)

I’ll be channeling this guy (and yes I know I’ve used this image five time before, that’s just how awesome it is)

I have five days. Sure I’m working three of them, but to hell with that. 4,000 words a day will see me win. I’ve already done 2,000 of today’s quota this morning so lets see if I can win this thing.

Cheerleaders totally wanted (ie/ fluff my ego, tell me I can totally do this)

Giveaway: 2013 Redlitzer Anthology

October 22, 2013 / / 2 Comments
Two copies available for you to win

Two copies available for you to win

I can’t believe it took me so long to get this up and running, but here, finally, is the giveaway of the first anthology my work has been published in.

I’m giving away two print copies of the 2013 Redlitzer Anthology which contains my first traditionally published short story ‘Stolen Hearts’. There are multiple ways to enter and some of them give multiple entries for one action.If you’re curious as to what I think of the anthology you can read my review either here on the blog, or my official Goodreads review.

This is an international giveaway (the only proviso being that I can ship to your location from here in Australia but I can’t imagine there are many places on the no-post list. If in doubt contact me and I’ll find out). You must be willing, if you win, to give me your postal address, but I assure you I won’t send you anything other than your prize and will never sell or release your address to a third party.

Only one copy will be given to each winner ie. you can’t win both copies, if you’re somehow lucky enough to win both copies your second win will be considered null and void and redrawn – you’ll still get the first copy though. Winning entries will be checked and validated after being drawn randomly.

Well with all the official stuff done with, start entering now!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Random Title Generator Fun

August 15, 2013 / / 1 Comment

Thanks to Chuck Wendig’s Flash fiction challenge this week I’ve discovered a very fun little toy for writers, the random title generator. The challenge only told us to write one story from the five the machine will generate. I did that. But there were some other good titles even in just that roll, so I rolled a few more times, and now I’m sharing those random titles (the good and the ‘ummm what?’ alike) for your amusement.

 

Bloodstained Doctor – I can’t think of anything not fanfiction, I’m hardwired that way I think…

Stars of the Phantom – oooh, this would make a cool little novella or something as a sequel to my novel ‘Written By The Stars’

Worm’s Comet – that’s the one I did, click the link to read it 😀

The Sun of the Living Waters – I’ve got an idea tingling, but it’s not strong as of yet

Reckless’s Hieroglyph – yes that’s an apostrophe, not a typo

In the Mistletoe of the Secret Jewels – yeah, what?

The Casket of the Iron Cosmic Pain – sounds too emo for me

Above a Pirate With a Rules – yay for grammar ;p

Accusing Child Under Red Doom – ok then

Strange War On Copper Cindarella – sounds kinda mythpunky, I might be able to do something with that

Beyond the Trail – why hello, I can definitely do something with this.

Guardian’s Devil – hmmmmm

Accidental Graveyard With Midnight Moonlight – I could do something with this, but I need to figure out how the weird phrasing in the title can work nicely into the story

Come Apocalypse – I do love me an apocalypse.

Link Shadow – more fan fiction, I won’t go there ;p

 

The-Guided-Fate-Paradox-logoAlso, I just learned about a new JRPG and it has the most amazing I’m-totally-jealous-I-didn’t-come-up-with-that-first title.

“The Guided Fate Paradox”.

Worse still it releases November (in America, no word on Aussie release date as of yet). No pretty game, don’t shatter my NaNoWriMo!

I’m currently working on my third attempt at a story for my group’s anthology (I keep blowing out the word count) and it’s tentatively title “The Eighteenth Soldier”.

Writers’ Group Or Critique Group?

July 28, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Yesterday I attended the first Writers’ Group Convention in South bank with several members of my critique group.

I'm looking for a little less this...

I’m looking for a little less this…

I love my group, as anyone who’s read any of my posts about them knows, but I also wish I could meet more than once a month. Some months (like this one) are very productive and I create a lot of new stuff and I want feedback, but I hate to ask some people for help because I know they already have a lot on their plate. So I’ve been looking for another group.

I was hoping there might even be one in my local area, but no one at the Redlitzer Writers’ Day last weekend knew of any.

At the Convention yesterday the representatives of many different groups stood up and spoke about how their groups worked. I learned that a lot of these groups met to do workshops together and create new fiction. There wasn’t a lot of critiquing and what critiquing there was seemed to be on the piece you had just written then and there.

and a little more of this.

and a little more of this.

Now I’m not saying those aren’t good groups, just not precisely what I’m looking for considering where I am in my journey as a writer. I have no problem with creativity, heck sometimes I just want to tell my muse “Here’s $8, go to the cinema and leave me alone so I can finish off this idea you just gave me” (I know, not something to really complain about, but evidence nonetheless that I don’t need an inspirational group). What I need is to learn how to fine tune this multitude of ideas. How to hone my stories into something that sells. For that I need a group very much like my current one.

I’m considering starting one in my local area, but don’t know how much time I want to sink into the endeavour – after all, that’s precious writing time I’d end up sacrificing.

The Writers’ Group Convention was short and sweet, with plenty of opportunities to mingle with others and try to learn their groups dynamics and if you are looking at finding a writers’ group yourself I’d recommend keeping an eye out for the next convention, or browsing their website.

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