Author: Claire Ryan (page 3)

Get in Formation

So… okay. Real talk for a moment. You guys ever heard of Beyoncé?

That’s a trick question. I’m pretty sure none of you are living under a rock on Mars.

Way back in the mists of time, around 2010, I was young(er) and foolish, and I wrote a blog post about the idea of Beyoncé’s music having deeper meaning, and whether that meaning was being read into the lyrics by a critic’s over-active imagination as opposed to being put there by the artist. Now I read that post and CRINGE, you guys. I cringe to the deepest part of my soul. I sound so godawfully pretentious.

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A long, strange January

A long, strange January

It’s been a long, odd month.

I’m still stuck in editing hell with The Nameless Knight, but I’m working on it. The cover is done, so the only thing left to do is get the book finished and out to the copyeditor.

I’ve started a new job, and some of my time is being hosed by that, obviously. It’s good for me though. Makes me feel better, being back at code.

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December Giveaway – and an Interview!

Well! Nanowrimo is done, and now Christmas is fast approaching. And I have been busy as hell!

The Goodreads giveaway is now over, and three lucky winners in the UK and the States now each have a copy of The Meldling on its way to them. I did run my usual mailing list giveaway, and I’ve contacted the person who won, but I still haven’t heard back from them. This gives me a sad, but all I can do is wait.

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Preventing E-Book Piracy

I’ve noticed, through the metrics that I get through Google, that some people are coming to my site to find out about ebook piracy, since I wrote about it here. I do tend to waffle on a bit about piracy in general, so grab your parrot and peg leg, kids! Let’s talk about how you can prevent those nasty pirates from uploading your treasured works to the torrent site du jour.

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Morally Complicated Y.A.

Behold, my friends, the latest storm of idiocy striking the heart of the traditional publishing industry. I present to you Exhibit A, the announcement of a new YA novel called The Cruelty bought for six figures and sold in umpteen territories and a movie deal and… yeah. Good times indeed. This book was self-published first, so this should be a feel-good success story, right?

Normally this would pass without comment, and I’d be happy for the author. But this, this is more than just a book announcement. The interview with the author on Publishers Weekly is the stuff of drama llama hell.

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Goodreads shenanigans

I have a Goodreads profile that I jump into occasionally to see what readers are up to. I honestly thought that I’d never be able to do a giveaway for my handbound books there, because how exactly do you do that for books with no ISBN or ASIN number? (ISBN = obvious, ASIN = Amazon’s identifier)

Well, after a few emails to the Goodreads support staff, I have a giveaway for three of my books!

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The Importance of Tea

This has nothing to do with bookbinding or swordfighting or writing, I know, but frankly I like to indulge myself sometimes. It’s 9am, I’m sleep-deprived, and right now the cause of that is only seven months old, and snoozing in bed and getting the shut-eye that I so desperately need, so ya know what – I’m going to write about tea.

Because tea is important, people. Especially if you’re Irish.

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Mailing List Shenanigans

Mailing List Shenanigans

Okay, I’ll be honest – I have almost no mailing list subscribers yet. That bums me out somewhat, but I’m still trying to figure this stuff out, so I won’t beat myself up too much.

And then my mailing list plugin went kablooey. As in, not working anymore. Screwed up. No longer fit for purpose.

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October Giveaway Winner!

You didn’t think I’d forget about this just because I’m doing NanoWrimo, did you?

The Nameless Knight is now in progress, and I’m sure that I’ll be deviating wildly from my outline in no time. Until the 30th, when I return from my bunker with the first draft, take a look at this nice book!

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September Giveaway Winner Annoucement

It’s the worst thing in the world when a binding fails. It happens every once in a while, when the materials I pick for covers or endpapers or glue turn out to be a bad choice. This belated announcement comes to you courtesy of some bad materials that just would not glue down properly, which resulted in me having to rebind a cover, scrap two entire text blocks of expensive parchment paper, and throw out umpteen test print pages of regular paper.

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