Trader’s Diary

It occurred to me late last night that I needed a promo for people to play on other podcasts and I wanted to do something a little different.

How’s this?

 

 Double Share Promo: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I should probably point out that this IS a drill… the book’s not on Podiobooks yet.

UPDATE: Some of the listeners have raised the issue — Does this give too much away? I actually *thought* that when I was putting it together, and I think I agree that it does. I’ve got a revised version that I’ll put up today. Here’s new version that I think works a bit better.

Since you’ve all been so nice, I’ll post the first episode prototype here. It’s the full text, but the ID3 tags are messed up, there’s, no cover art in it, and there may well be editing flubs since even the QC team hasn’t heard this full episode yet.

Direct from me, to you.

 

 Double Share : Episode 1: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Thanks to Great Big Sea for the music .. and I’m hoping they’ll get back from Vancouver soon and check their email.

The music came from Podshow’s Music Directory

Sorry. I’m having problems getting this migration to go smoothly.

Hang in and I’ll get it taken care off ASAP

Update: I think I’ve got the holes, links, images, and uploads all put back where they belong.

If you find something hosed, leave a comment here or on the fan forums which are *still* at http://durandus.org/fans - at least for the moment.

OK, it’s a tease … but I think this is where I’m going. I just did this take this morning as a final “dial in” on the audio settings for the gear.

 

 Double Share Sample : Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

What do you think? Can you listen to 25 episodes? The real ones will be longer, I promise.

One of you wonderful fans sent me a link this great medley of jigs from a Canadian Band named Great Big Sea. The music is from PodShow so is licensed for use in podcasts already. I like this tune and think it would be more compelling than the sparse sounds of the other tune.

 

 Standard Podcast: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

How about you? I need to adjust my narration in the outro a bit and I’ve written to the band to see if there’s something they’d rather I said there, but .. what do you think? Better? Worse? Go with “Larry O’Gaff”…?

I like the way this sounds, but what about you folks?

 

 Standard Podcast: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

What do you think? Does this make you want the story even more now?

Yes. Faithful Fans.

The book is complete. It needs some polish, probably a little fiddling. I’m sure I’ve crossed up a plot line or two, but it’s complete.

Last Friday the book was 78k. By Monday it was 96k. I threw away 15k words because the flow was wrong and then rearranged the rest. What that means is that I’ve written something around 25,000 words in the last three days.

I need to find the music before I can begin audio production so if you have any fav’s that you think might work, leave me a comment with the link and I’ll check it out.

Right now, I’m exhausted.

Well, not as good a week as I’d hoped, but I spent 6,500 words on a side project with another author. You’ll hear more about that when the Sekrit Is Revealed. It’ll be fun, I think.

And in other news, some of you know already, but there’s a fan forum. If you wanted to talk about the books or play in the sandbox, you can find a really plain looking forum at http://durandus.org/fans

Be nice and have fun.

Back on the book front. It looks like we’ll break the magic 80k mark tomorrow, and then its just a question of wrapping up the plot threads. There are a few of them, but it’s been fun so far.

Keep the faith. I’m still shooting to get this up by the Fourth. We’ll see.

This week took a nose dive when I got embroiled in a day job related fiasco that took 25,000 words away from Double Share. Still, the plot is percolating nicely.The beta readers are positive.

Yes, this is a different story, but I think a richer one. It’s not inconceivable that I’ll have the first draft done by Monday, but I expected to be much further along than I am by now.

I’m also pretty sure we’re going to get a bit bigger than the bare 80k words that I planned for. It wouldn’t surprise me to get to 100,000 before I’m done.

Thanks for your patience and I hope you find these little status reports to be useful.

We’re at 48,000 words on the road to 80k.

I’m writing about 4k a day in a normal day and 7k on thursdays and fridays.

The story is shaping up nicely, but I still need to get one of the winning ships in there. Several of you will find yourselves as crew, characters in the story, or even have buildings named for you.

This book has so many Easter Eggs, I’m expecting Bunny Local #1524 to pay me a visit for Union work rule violations, but it sure is fun.