by bfuniv
Become An Author – Squidoo A Book!
July 20, 2009 in Featured, Tutorial Lenses by bfuniv
No picture on the back of a dustcover for me, my bearded face looking wise, my pipe held just so, and a rugged but humble visage upon my face. I’ve gone one better, I have an avatar on Squidoo, and my own bio blurb!
There are lots of cool reasons to write your book on Squidoo. For one thing you get paid, yes YOU can be publisher and finisher of your own career as a paid author. Give it all to charity and everyone will honor your avatar with an admiring second glance.
I’ve decided the difference between a writer and an author is not the material you write, or if some somebody decides to risk printing a few thousand copies of your book, sending them to a few outlets. Nope. You are a writer if you write for yourself. You become an author when you edit what you have written to please an audience. It doesn’t matter if stodgy editors at a big name publisher have your beloved manuscript in a slush pile awaiting elimination. Here is the trick:
- Get a good idea or phrase in your head, sit down at your computer and put it in a text module.
- Throw some other modules around it – you are a writer!
- Each time those phrases and ideas start buzzing in your head, sit down and add them to your first chapter, or start another chapter.
- Get an idea of where you would like to finish, then let your characters show you how to get there. You created them, now they have their own agendas; kinda like having your kids turn into teenagers.
- If you like rules make an outline. As a general rule – I don’t like rules.
- If you hit writer’s block, make a few Amazon or poll modules. If that doesn’t trigger something, go sit down and relax and think about your canon, the back story of your characters that made them the way they are.
I wrote up my back story and made a lens out of it, The Complicity Universe. When I got a new idea, or learned more about my characters, I played with the concepts there. You can use my universe for any art project you wish, I’ve made it open content.
Do whatever you want in the Complicity Universe. Fanfic, web fiction, macramé, Ipod art, quote me on t-shirts and coffee cups. You wanna piece of complicity, take it away. There is a guest book, if you create something based on Complicit Simplicity, leave a link so others can find it. There are no rules but your own in your own works.
A text module is 10,000 characters, I get silly and use big words, but you probably write better than I do. My average word is about 5 characters long, my average chapter about 6000 characters or a bit over a thousand words. It took 24 chapters to tell my little story. I wrote it to please me (and my characters). I’m a writer.
I thought I would write one chapter, maybe two, as an example. When I had four chapters in that first lens, I realized that Gloria, Mose, and Jon weren’t going to let me stop until they were satisfied. I started writing one chapter per lens. We had fun.
I’ll let it mellow a month or two, by then I’ll be ready to re-write and edit it for others. It will get bigger, I will become an author.
If you aspire to publish a book, the big name publishers will want to know about “your platform” — a group that will immediately buy your book. I just finished it yesterday. 60 people have looked at Complicit Simplicity this week, next week it will probably be more – I’m building a platform.
Also with lot’s of guest books my readers can make suggestions, offer criticisms, and point out errors. Complicit Simplicity will become a better book. I’ll become a better author. This is win-win-win, as long as you enjoy reading it too.
I know. You want to look at this book.
Strange coincidence. I want you to look at it.
Complicit Simplicity – The Hackers’ End Game
Then write your own book on Squidoo.
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