So who wants in?

You might be aware that I’m trying to make a living with words. Anyone who doesn’t… go check out my Smashwords account and buy something, plib-blobbit!

Ahem.

Thing is, I need beta-readers. People willing to read things-I-consider-finished, things-I-don’t-know-what-I’m-doing-with and things-I’m-checking-up-on-to-see-I’m-still-going-in-the-right-direction. AKA WIPs.

I have a whole pet universe I want to share. Short stories, long stories, stories of inbetweenish dimensions… all waiting for readers to help with the quality control.

And I can’t afford to pay because… well… I don’t have an income as of yet.

I’m also going to be experimenting with my pricing and, if I’m really lucky, find someone willing to do some better covers than my own considerable lack of skill.

Anyone who wants in, please send me an email address [either by ask or by reply, whatever suits you] and I shall be sending you some PDFs in the nearish future.

Are you game?

Challenge me?

Posting fanfic isn’t going to help me be a better writer [New year’s resolution#1: Work to improve myself] but it is going to attract my old fans, which means more readers. I need readers :)

So. Along side the fanficcery that promises to become a long-standing tradition in this blog [over 100 fanfics, remember?] I am going to accept challenges from my audience.

Send me a springboard. A favourite phrase, a title of some media you love, ask a question about my pet universe[chronicled partially here], even an In-a With-a While-a*. I will concoct a drabble or a short story right here on my blog. Just for you.

*In-a With-a While-a is a game from Theatre Sports, where actors improvised a scene based on “in a [Place] with a [anything, really] while a [event]”.

Short stories concocted this way may be ‘Plot-What-Plot’s. You have been warned. Questions may be answered factually as well as fictionally. You get to decide which is which.

You can use my Ask box or use an answer. I don’t mind either.

This challenge will be reposted when I’ve run out of springboards.

Merry Halloween!

Fifty-four peeps have downloaded my free story [And a few of you have sampled the others available] so here’s a thank-you pic of sorts. The Oshit in all its fuzzy, cuddly glory… as rendered by Xotxot.

Of course, when I’m finally a famous author, I’ll be giving these darlings away as toys :D What say you all to ‘Orrible 'Airy Oshit onna stick? Plush cuddly Oshit pillow dolls?

Scavenger is live!

Yes! The free book is out. Go. Download. Read. Enjoy.

ps, Happy 40th to me.

pps, Somehow, I have two folks downloading before I have the ISBN'ed version up. Go me.

Things to be grateful for #5247985965490921…

The fact that Xotxot came through with the brilliant cover on the right; so that you get to read a book with that cover, rather than the nasty thing on the left that I came up with.

First thing tomorrow morn, mytime, that cover is going to be in my Smashwords profile. Enjoy!

Progress report of a sort

Okay, so I finally got off my divot and transferred my soon-to-be-released free book into MSWord 7 ‘cause that’s the only editor that exists for the nice folks at Smashwords 9_9

Now I’m just waiting for @xotxot to get back to me about the cover.

I’m getting nervous. As I usually do when my success at a plan is entirely dependant on someone else. I’ve had plans of mine fail purely because someone I was depending on couldn’t/wouldn’t/didn’t feel like doing me a favour.

The question I put to you is:

Should I concoct a cover in my typical Suck-O-Vision limited Inkscape skills, just in case? Or should I have faith that it will all work out somehow?

An announcement

Firstly, I would like to thank Neil Gaiman for the idea that wound its way into my head and did what ideas do best: mutate into near cthulu-esque proportions.

See, the kind and apparently flamingo-like Mr Gaiman came up with/publicised All Hallows Read, an event in which people who celebrate Halloween [and even those who choose not to] can give away a spooky book to friends, family or complete strangers.

So I wrote a completely new story. From go to whoa, it took me two weeks, including piddly editing details that are now my new definition of Purgatory [Sorry, Mum].

I did try to write spooky. Almost all atmosphere and the world-gone-wrong and big hairy things jumping on the hero(ine)… but it still wound up as comedy. Le sigh.

I’m giving it away for free anyway.

So watch my Smashwords page come October 4 [Though since I’m Australian, most of you will see it Oct 5…] as my special birthday present to everyone who cares to read my shit stuff is a free short story.

I would very much like it if the folks who took the time to read said free story paid some real money for my other works, but that’s just icing on the cake as far as I’m concerned.

What I really want for my birthday, is to be read.

Have fun.

A poem by me

A Question

Why must my mind forever play

With endless bits of yesterday?

I cannot, now, do less nor more

Than anything I did before.

But my imagination cannot set

Aside the game that’s called Regret.

Threat of the MathMagician [OR: Are you smarter than an Australian 5th-grader?]

Here it is! The link is to the zip file and should instantly download. If it doesn’t, try right-clicking and select “save linked file as”.

This zip file contains information other than the map folder, which is clearly labeled. It was intended for teachers to use in classes, so teacher information is in its own folder. If you plan on using this as a single player, you don’t really need to bother with the teacher’s folder. Just worry about the map and the in-game text.

The trivia is trivia. You can go through that if you want to.

I am looking for beta players, especially when it comes do getting the highest possible score. If you must make a youtube video, please try to keep out the swears, as the game environment was made for 10-11YO’s. Oh, and send me a link, I’d love to see it :)

Reviewers: Be kind. It’s my first map and the first time I’ve even tried to make a map.

Install instructions [Assumes you have Minecraft]

Windows

1) Download the Map from mediafire.com (Link Given)
2) Put the .zip file on your desktop (or somewhere where you can easily find it again.)
3) Press Start, and type in %appdata%. Click into Roaming. *XP - Press Start, Run, then %appdata%. Click into Roaming.
4) Go into .minecraft/saves. 
5) Unzip the file Folder and place the unzipped map folder into the saves folder.
6) Play and Enjoy!

Mac

1) Download the map from mediafire.com (Link Given)
2) Put the .zip file on your desktop (or somewhere where you can easily find it again.)
3) Go into: Finder/Application Support/minecraft/saves.
4) Unzip the file Folder and place the unzipped map folder into the saves folder.
5) Play and Enjoy!

Multiplayer

1) Download the map from mediafire.com (Link Given)
2) Put the .zip file on your desktop (or somewhere where you can easily find it again.)
3) Go into your minecraft server directory.
4) Rename the current world folder with something relevant to that map. e.g “MathMagician”.
5) Paste the map folder into the minecraft server directory.
6) Rename the folder to world.
7) Run the Server and Play!