All Blog Posts Tagged 'Spaceships' (78)

     Finished my newest middle grade sci/fi novel, INSECTLAND yesterday and now it’s off to get its cover. I am using my usual ebook cover person, Judy Bullard. This is a book I started in January of 1997 and have been tweaking ever since. It’s funny how some novels can be written in a few months while others, like this one, can take years.

     Actually, I think I need to clarify something here. It didn’t take me this long to write the book, I actually wrote the book in four months…

Here is an excerpt from one of my novels.

PULP

By

N. D. Ostroff

CHAPTER 1

How it all began

I knew I shouldn’t…

My wife and I live near a lake and every morning we take a long walk. Well, this morning my wife turns to me and says out of the blue; “You need to make 1.4 million dollars.”

“Done,” I replied.

“No really,” she pressed. “We need 1.4 million dollars.”

“Why that amount?” I asked.

She gave me this answer. 1.4 million dollars is the number she came up with that will allow us to retire; which sounded good to me since we’re both in our early forties. She came…

     For years and years, I dreamed of hitting it big as a writer. That dream kept me going through twelve hour days slaving in a corporate kitchen, through hard financial times, and even through bad relationships. The dream got closer when I signed with a top NY agency and even closer when editors of big publishing houses were requesting my stuff. But alas, the big viral hit still hasn’t happened. The books are written and being written, and quite a few are available for purchase and have…

     I’ve been publishing about a book every three months for the last two years. But it’s only in the last six months that I’ve published my stuff electronically on Kindle and Smashwords, and started heavy marketing and promotion on the internet. Now, you’ve got to understand, these are books that I’ve written over the course of twenty years. They have been through countless edits and critiques by friends and professionals. All have been through the ringer with good agents and…

     It used to be that to become a published author (besides just writing a really good book) you had to also spend countless hours writing and addressing query letters, waiting patiently for agent’s responses (months), and then miracle upon miracles, you get signed to a LEGITIMATE agency. That’s only the beginning. Now, it’s up to the agent to make that one-in-a-hundred sale as opposed to the one-in-a-million chance an un-agented author had. And again, miracle upon miracles, it…

Today is the day I started my promo/marketing for DROP OUT. Already logged up 4 sales (woo hoo). I discovered a great link on Goodreads that takes you to people who are looking for book recommendations. Some people just tell you what books they've read and that they're looking for something similiar, and some people actually describe the type of book they want to read. This is awesome because I have six different books that I can suggest. And the best part, there are at least 30,000 of these…

My newest novel, DROP OUT goes live tomorrow, yeah!!! But what is almost as rewarding as publishing a new novel is what happened to me the other day. But first, let me tell you a story about Neil at 17 years old. Here I was, a geeky high school student with a crush on one of the school's cheerleaders. Now, I knew she was out of my league from the start, but I was young and bold, and figured what the hey. So I let it be known that I liked her. (back then there were no cell phones, or…

Well, my mom finally read my book DEGENERATES http://www.amazon.com/Degenerates-N-D-Ostroff/dp/1440173028/ref%3Dsr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1299436405&sr=8-3…

And the heat wave continues around here. There's only one thing good about it being this hot outside, I don't feel guilty staying inside. Anyway, the writing life continues heat or no heat. I blasted out another chapter of INSECTLAND today, actually it's a re-read. I wrote the original way back in 1997 as part of a three book series. the first book TIM MADISON GALACTIC WARRIOR is available right now at:…

Okay, I got over the woman who bashed me. Thanks to all who responded with their own stories of jerks.



So, in my continued quest to get rich and famous I've come up with a few marketing ideas. First off, though not an original idea, I've decided to get bookmarks made that have pics. of my books and my website, plus info to buy them. I'm putting some at the front desk of the hotel I work at and I am going to local stores to ask if I can put them on the counter so people can…

If you like books that will keep you awake at night reading, then check out this interview.

http://wwwthouhtfulreflections.blogspot.com/2011/07/after-author-neil-dostroff-has-another.html

All the thousands of hours of work I put into DROP OUT and it's off to the

formatter and done forever. Yeah! So, I've decided to devote myself to marketing

this week because I have the time and I was going to give AFTER one more blast

before I started rewriting INSECTLAND and marketing and promoting DROP OUT.

Okay, all is well and good. I've done my usual postings on Kindle forums and my

various writers sites that I belong to. But the other day I discovered something…

All set to go with DROP OUT. My format guy has it and I'm preparing to market

and promote. I recently read an article about how an Indie author can make a

living writing ebooks. There actually is a secret and here it is. WRITE A LOT OF

BOOKS! The article said that most authors who are earning a decent living from

their books have at least seven that are available. If you do the numbers it

makes sense. I've sold approximately forty copies of AFTER this month.…

Okay, so I finished the final of the final read for DROP OUT and I am excited to

release it into the world. Truth be told, this is the book that my agent said he

didn't want to try to sell because it was so out of my genre. But it is a story

that I always wanted to tell about the impotance of living life to its fullest.

My initial readers burst into tears at points while reading it, telling me how

sad it was, but also how meaningful. I'm curious as to the repsonse it…

So those of you who have been following my blog know that I recently published

my first ebook AFTER and I detailed the marketing and promotion strategy in this

blog. Well, just as I'm about to begin the process of releasing my next ebook

DROP OUT, I learn a very valuable lesson that probably put five months of

promotion in the toilet. AFTER has sold copies, though not nearly as many as I'd

hoped considering I'd spent months marketing and currently my combined…

Well, it's happening again. I've got the cover nearly complete for my new ebook DROP OUT. I'm currently tweaking the pitch for it and I must say, a website called http://www.mywriterscircle.com helped greatly. I posted my summary and got lots of free feedback which was awesome! I can't believe how much time some people took in editing my sample. It was like getting a dozen free edits. I highly recommend that site ansd also the Kindle forums.…

author's site

I recently discovered a great site for free feedback on your writing. It's:

Mywriterscircle.com.  I put up the first chapter of my new sci/fi novel

INSECTLAND and already have more than 60 views and ten comments on improvement.

Wow. The only catch is that you have to read and comment on others writing. But

hey, there's no longer a need to pay hundreds if not thousands of dollars for

editing when you can get it free!! These writers on the site are good, too.…