Jumping on the bandwagon

[ChickenHawk]

Wrangled made it below the 7000 mark before rising again and is sitting just below 8000.

Congrats on making the top 10,000 paid!!! I don't know what the general pattern is, but I will say that my "overnight success" book didn't peak in the rankings until maybe a month after launch -- so this might be only the beginning of a very nice trajectory for Wrangled!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[COSenior]

Congrats on making the top 10,000 paid!!! I don't know what the general pattern is, but I will say that my "overnight success" book didn't peak in the rankings until maybe a month after launch -- so this might be only the beginning of a very nice trajectory for Wrangled!

That's good to know, thanks!

Wow, just checked on it, and Wrangled is under 5000 Paid and ranked in the Top 100 in both Books and Kindle store for Western romance! @ChickenHawk, I heart you!

 

[AubreyRose]

Yeah, no lists for freebies, sorry - I think the boxed set thing is not going to work either pretty soon anyway, people are taking advantage of it too much I hope your book gets back on track, 7000 is great!

 

[COSenior]

Yeah, no lists for freebies, sorry - I think the boxed set thing is not going to work either pretty soon anyway, people are taking advantage of it too much I hope your book gets back on track, 7000 is great!

It's wavered twice, once to bob back up over 8000 and a second time at around 3000, but as of this morning is still dropping. Or going up. How do you say it when the number goes lower as the rank goes higher? Up or down? Anyway, this morning's number is 2807. I have an undeclared bet with my publisher whether we can make Top 100 with no advertising strictly for this book. He says no, I'd love to prove him wrong, but no matter what, this is fun!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Held for Ransom]

Anyway, this morning's number is 2807.

Um, I'm at the bar at Ocean Prime when you are ready...

 

[COSenior]

Um, I'm at the bar at Ocean Prime when you are ready...

Oh, man! Didn't see this and we went for Korean BBQ. Hope you're not waiting for us!

 

[COSenior]

Unhunh, now for the let-down. Free promotion ended on Rustled, shooting it into oblivion at 34-something thousand. The good news is that it was at 92-something thousand first thing this morning, and both of those numbers are still an order of magnitude better than my neglected early stuff under the first pen name.

Wrangled is holding pretty well at #2436 paid/#31 in its genre. I'm wondering if it will now help pull Rustled up. As fun as this week was, my head is spinning with questions about what really happened, and since I haven't a clue how to begin to analyze it or work toward duplication, I'm just going to keep writing #3 in the linked stories.

Unfortunately, I seem to have writer's elbow. After this post, I'm getting off the computer for the day and not getting on again until tomorrow afternoon. I'm going hiking in the morning. Hopefully my alpine poles won't exacerbate the problem, because I genuinely can't afford to lay off for a week at this point to let the inflammation heal itself. Maybe I'll forego the poles.

@Held for Ransom, if I hear one 'I told you so' from your general direction, no Ocean Prime for you! I'm hearing enough of it from my ownself.

None of this dampens my general goofy pleasure over the fun ride I've had in the last week. Onward and upward, my friends! Like ziplining, I want to do that again.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[ChickenHawk]

Unhunh, now for the let-down. Free promotion ended on Rustled, shooting it into oblivion at 34-something thousand. The good news is that it was at 92-something thousand first thing this morning, and both of those numbers are still an order of magnitude better than my neglected early stuff under the first pen name.

Wrangled is holding pretty well at #2436 paid/#31 in its genre. I'm wondering if it will now help pull Rustled up.

I've heard that such a drop is pretty typical, because as far as Amazon's stats go, you've had zero paid sales for the last few days. But now, it should be on the "also boughts" for a ton of titles, including Wrangled. Yay! I'm thinking that's where the climb should come in. You were SO smart to finish Wrangled in time to draft of this.

I'm sorry to hear about your elbow. Hope it feels better soon!

 

[COSenior]

But now, it should be on the "also boughts" for a ton of titles, including Wrangled.

At HfR's suggestion, I was looking at the also-boughts on both pages, as well as the also-boughts for each of those...guess whose book came up in well over half of the second level? YOURS! Tickled me to death.

 

[COSenior]

The good news: Rustled has risen in the ranks enough to rank in the Top 100 for its category, still not quite as high as Wrangled, but working toward it. We're extremely pleased with the outcome of this ad.

The bad news: Tennis elbow. It isn't very bad yet, but I can't keep going at my rapid pace with the setup I have now. I took the weekend and yesterday off. Today I ordered Dragon Premium. (BTW, if you want to do that, order it direct from Nuance, call customer support and ask for a discount. I got it for half price.) I hope it will work for me, better than some of the reports I've seen from forum contributors. If it does, I'll be dictating from the blue tooth headset while doing housework and maybe walking on that boring treadmill. If not, I'm going to have to slow WAY down, at least until I've seen a physical/occupational therapist and maybe changed my desk. Mine's low-tech. Anyway, an enforced 2-3 more days off while I wait for the software to be delivered. This is not according to plan!

If you take anything at all out of this, take this: Don't say or believe 'it can't happen to me'. Yes, I'm older, and I should have seen it coming; in fact, I did. But the same thing happened to a much younger HfR, maybe not the same body part letting him down, I don't know, but health got in the way of progress. So, since I went out on a limb and got it cut out from under me, I'm here to say, take care of your body. Make sure your ergonomics are correct, and don't push yourself to the point of physical pain or fatigue every day. Hey, there's no preacher like a reformed sinner, right?

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Rawr]

No kidding on the physical toil. I am now actively scheduling massage sessions because I know my back is getting worse. I am watching my posture closely and the next investment will be in a great chair.

 

[COSenior]

To my delight, I received the software around noon today and have spent the afternoon installing it, training it, training me, and practicing. So far, it would be far faster to type, if my hands were healthy, but if I can learn to dictate at 40-60 words a minute (the software claims to be able to handle 160), that will increase productivity dramatically, from an average of 1000-1200 to a fabulous 3000 WPH. That's a full-length novel a week, folks. Committed to making it work.

Tips from my client/mentor:
Make a list of what points I want to cover in the scene before writing it; dictate the list if I want. He's read somewhere that it takes about 40 hours of dictation before it becomes natural.

 

[Erock87]

Sorry to hear about the elbow, COS, but we are very interested in tracking how effective you find this. I imagine you would almost have to outline everything first, and then dictate it as to make coherent sequences.

Keep us posted!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[lleone]

So happy for your success! You're such an inspiration and your progress totally keeps me motivated and moving forward. Sorry to hear about the tennis elbow. Interested to see how you like Dragon Premium after you've had a couple of weeks of working with it. I've been trying not to sit so much, so setup a makeshift standing desk. Hope it will help in some ways.

I just checked your ratings and they are awesome...4 stars and 4.5 stars. Such a great job!

 

[COSenior]

Couldn't handle the headset that came with my Dragon bundle. Fortunately the headset I had previously passed the test. Had to retrain Dragon, but managed 1360 words in my three hours. Sigh.

 

[Dave C]

Just a suggestion but could you record your story and pay someone to transcribe it? I hear medical students amongst others will do this at a very cheap rate and it'll mean you're output will improve exponentially.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[COSenior]

Just a suggestion but could you record your story and pay someone to transcribe it? I hear medical students amongst others will do this at a very cheap rate and it'll mean you're output will improve exponentially.

It's the speaking rather than typing that's actually the problem. So far it's not flowing as well as I speak. Or maybe I'm just not as aware of my fits and starts when I'm typing, because I can think faster than I type. Thanks for the suggestion, though.

 

[Held for Ransom]

I tried this route as well @COSenior. Sorry to hear you aren't feeling well.

To be honest, I just couldn't make a go of it even after doing it for a few novellas. About 100K published words or so.

Pretty much what I had to do was limit the time I spent on the computer to writing (mostly) which meant less forum time, I stopped doing my own covers, etc. There's a lot of things I quit doing online just so I could give myself a real chance at years in the game.

Nowadays, unless I am studying the craft or I am actually writing, I don't use my computer. I'm down to about five or six hours a day right now and I feel much better. I know how tempting it is to just be hardcore about it all the time but it did catch up to me.

Everyone is different though.

Anyway, it's just the way things worked best for me. Even with that, it still took a brand new workstation, $1000s in doctor bills and on and on to finally realize that hey, maybe if I just limited it to "work", I'd feel better.

I know you don't waste time like that @COSenior but few have your discipline. Haha.

Pulling for you...

 

[COSenior]

I know you don't waste time like that @COSenior but few have your discipline. Haha.

Ha! Shows what you know. I'm on here three times a day, pontificating. And then there are the hour-long Skype sessions...but I'm actually coming to terms with the Dragon. I think it's going to work out.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Held for Ransom]

Nevermind then. Slacker.

 

[COSenior]

Nevermind then. Slacker.

LOL

 

[AroundTheWorld]

@COSenior -

I'm currently snowed in, so I figured it would be a perfect time to catch up on some reading and of course Rustled was fitting.
Just finished it and went over to Amazon to review. Looks like you are getting some nice volume in terms of reviews!

Just wanted to say congrats and nice work!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[COSenior]

@COSenior -

I'm currently snowed in, so I figured it would be a perfect time to catch up on some reading and of course Rustled was fitting.
Just finished it and went over to Amazon to review. Looks like you are getting some nice volume in terms of reviews!

Just wanted to say congrats and nice work!

Thank you!

 

[joanna]

I keep trying to get into DNS, but having to do corrections can be so painful :/ For fantasy with lots of made up names it's a royal pain. And I still can't get over how weird it feels when you say the story out loud. Like you said @COSenior there's a lot of stops and starts you suddenly become aware of. One thing I realized is that I often write almost a few words at a time, and I've noticed that DNS seems to work better if I give it longer chunks. Need. To. Keep. Trying.

Any more advice from people who are already using Dragon?

 

[COSenior]

Prepare yourself for a wall of text; you were warned!

First, though, a link to a free resource with some useful information about writing technique: http://bubblecow.net/writing/ Thanks to @GiroudJD for posting the link that led me to it.

Now for the update. My recent decision to test Dragon Naturally Speaking to ward off nerve damage to my hands has forced me to consider the best way to maintain or even improve production rate, as I have found narrating the story aloud quite awkward and slower than typing at first. I was aided by a tip from a mentor to make a scene outline or checklist before starting to dictate.

I've been asked many times to explain my ability to write up to 10k words per day (not average, as some have said--UP TO). Part of the secret is my willingness to sit at the computer for up to ten hours a day just writing (though it's usually more like eight--that's still a lot of hours at the computer), and part is the mechanics of the planning process I use before I ever start writing the story.

So I'm going to lay out the process here, again, to include the new step required for my best use of DNS, in the hope that it will help someone who's just getting started.

This is not to say this is the only way to achieve this production rate, nor even the best. It's simply the way I do it, and furthermore, it's done strictly for commercial advantage; no art here, folks.

Fair warning: I'm a plotter, not a pantser. I could no more sit down to write a story without semi-detailed planning than fly. If you believe that you produce a better story without planning, stop right here. You probably do, and what follows will likely mess you up, or at least make you go cross-eyed for a few minutes.

My process:

Step 1: Determine genre (see @Held for Ransom's Hello from Denver - self publishing success) and brainstorm a concept to fit. Write a 1-2 page concept document that captures the idea. You can add to the concept document as the story 'cooks', or not. Your choice.

Step 2: Select an appropriate beatsheet and determine target length of the story so you'll pace it correctly. By appropriate, I mean there are several out there that have different purposes, and one might be better for your chosen genre than another.

I started out using Blake Snyder's Save the Cat beatsheet, struggling to understand what the descriptions meant, what each section of the story should contain, etc. It's worth studying, and will begin to make more and more sense as you write and read with it in mind. However, there are a number of others listed here: http://www.savethecat.com/beat-sheets-alpha/.

Most recently, as I write in romance genres, I've been using Jami Gold's version, found here: http://jamigold.com/2012/11/write-romance-get-your-beat-sheet-here/. I apologize to the forum members who first brought these to my attention, as I can't remember now who it was. That's a testament to the many writers who are contributing here, not to mention my poor memory.

Step 3: This is where I depart from other methodologies. After reading about the Snowflake Method and deciding it was overkill for what I was writing, I developed a second spreadsheet as a companion to the beat sheet. Some of you will consider it impossibly nerdy and way too much trouble, but if you have a good understanding of your spreadsheet application, it's actually quite simple, and IMHO, more useful and less trouble than the snowflake.

Before I get into it, let me address outlining. As a student, I took notes in formal outline form. For decades, I thought I was quite comfortable with it. Then I was introduced to the mind map. If you aren't familiar with it, here's a wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_map. I've never considered myself particularly creative, but if I were, this would certainly be superior to the old, rigid, outline form. For those of you who may want a looser planning process than I'm describing here, this may be just the tool you're looking for. Just Google 'mind map' if you'd like software to help.

Back to my process. My spreadsheet template contains a generic number of rows for scenes in each beat, and total rows that link to the appropriate beat sheet field for a target in a different column. What this spreadsheet does is allow me to briefly describe the purpose of each scene, and as I write them, put the word count in so that as I write I understand how much I have to fill in with to pace the story correctly. I also have columns that show me exactly how many words to go for the beat target, total word count for the manuscript and words to go for the book target.

Put a different way, it shows me where my plot is thin and new elements must be introduced. The reason for linking the spreadsheets is to automatically update word count per beat if I see that the story is going to take more or less than originally planned; all I have to do is update the word count in the appropriate field of the beat sheet, and it will be calculated and propagated through to the scene map, where I may need to write more or more likely cut to maintain the pacing.

Step 4: This is the new step necessitated by DNS. Each scene now needs a list of points to be made. As I use Scrivener as my writing environment, I'll use the notecard view of the scenes with bullets for this part, and then simply erase each point as I make it while I build the scene, before transferring the contents of the DNS dictation box into the Scrivener scene.

Step 5: Begin composing. Even now, after only a few days of dictation and with fits and starts as I speak, I'm approaching the 1000 wph that I expect of myself as a minimum when typing. I'm hoping to triple that with the addition of Step 4. Trust me, you can think much faster than you can type, and if you can train yourself to speak your thoughts out loud, DNS (after suitable training to recognize your speech characteristics) should increase production, though it may require heavier editing afterward.

@Held for Ransom, I'd welcome you to weigh in on this point, as I'm aware you eventually decided against DNS after plenty of use to test it. If you could elaborate on what you found uncomfortable about it, it may be very helpful to someone. I believe your writing process is quite different from mine, which may make a difference--I guess we'll see as I go along.

Other points: You will notice that I didn't mention locale descriptions, character charts, etc. Do I use them? Yes and no. I expect to do more of that as I gain more experience, and it will become part of Step 1. Up to now, I've named and described characters and locales as I needed them, but I can see the value in understanding my characters' backstory and environment before I start. I use Scrivener, which makes this very easy to do, as well as making it easy to move scenes or chapters around as required.

That's it...although I'm sure some will require more detailed explanations here or there. Feel free to ask. None of this is trade secrets, so if I can ease your journey, I'm happy to do it.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[COSenior]

For fantasy with lots of made up names it's a royal pain.

Can't you train DNS to recognize those names? I'm certain the latest version will. Of course, if they're unpronounceable, that could be a problem.

 

[Hicks]

Just what i needed as I make first attempt at novel. All rep transferredtransferred

 

[joanna]

Can't you train DNS to recognize those names? I'm certain the latest version will. Of course, if they're unpronounceable, that could be a problem.

I tried adding some of the main character names, but it still tries to use random common names instead. And some of them aren't even that fancy. I mean how hard can it be to recognise "Ina"... But when I have some spare time and enthusiasm I try going back to DNS to see if I can make it work *this time* )) It does end up with more editing work though.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[COSenior]

I get it. Since I wrote that, I've given up fighting with Scrivener to use the 'e' on the end of a surname that usually doesn't have one. I'll just use Word's search and replace feature to fix it after I'm done. I have another character named Raj that gets four or five different spellings depending on how much I say before or afterwards in one breath. Still, whatever the pain, it doesn't compare to that burning feeling from my elbow to my wrist down the outside of my arm.

 

[COSenior]

For anyone just starting to attempt to use Dragon Naturally Speaking with Scrivener, or considering doing so, I have a couple of pieces of information that may help you make a decision or save you some pain.

1) DNS cannot be directly dictated into Scrivener as it can to Word and other recognized word processing programs. You have to use the DNS Dictation Box, and then transfer the writing to your Scrivener scene, which is easy enough. Or, you could probably dictate into Word and then manually copy and paste, although that seems to me to negate the point of using Scrivener to begin with.

2) DNS will occasionally send your writing into a black hole, never to be seen again, unless you select an option in the settings that saves it on the clipboard. I recommend also setting it to use the Windows copy and paste function. That did save me once when Scrivener decided to do away with my writing.

3) Once you have your writing transferred to Scrivener, IMMEDIATELY do a manual save. The clipboard only saves the last thing you transferred, so if you, for example, highlight everything in the scene in order to change the formatting and accidentally hit the wrong key, it's gone, you can't use Undo, and you'll still lose your work. I don't know why Undo didn't work, nor what key I hit to disappear that work, but I can tell you exactly what it feels like when you see a blank page that previously had over 2000 words in it. It feels like someone kicked you in the stomach, hard. Fortunately, a little over half of it was still on the clipboard, but I still had almost 1000 words to write again. I also recommend you transfer more often than that, in case a mishap does happen, so you'll have less to recapture.

In spite of it all, I'm fairly well pleased with DNS. Once I iron out the kinks, I'm convinced it will help me produce faster. I've been using it only a few days, less than a week when you take away the weekend when I wasn't writing, and I'm already achieving about 1500 WPH not counting my mishaps. The words are flowing more smoothly now, and I'm feeling less awkward with the whole process. Today I scene-mapped an entire new novel and then created each chapter and scene in Scrivener, putting notes from the scene map into the Scrivener framework so I'll know what I want to cover without looking back and forth. I expect it to fly with the work laid out like that.