What were you thinking?

Hello, Universe, do you have a minute or two? Great, because I had a shite day and I'd like to get something off my chest. If you don't mind, I'm having a w(h)ine now.
You know I'm eternally thankful that you lay the grounds for my becoming an author and editor; despite having a break from writing, I know there are still enough novels slumbering in me and they will, at some point, demand their way out. 
But, I'm wondering what warped sense of humour you must possess to have made me meet Shawn and fall head over heels for him? I mean, what the fuck? Seriously. Okay, I've loved cycling all my life and my bikes always meant the world to me, but this? Of course I'm enjoying the change from mountain bike to road bike, and I haven't looked back, but you are aware that I'm shoulder-deep in bicycle parts, tools I never knew even existed, and when I spoke about bottom brackets with a handy man today, he shook his head, saying it's going way over his head.
Personal progress aside: Do you know how frustrating it is to have three complete bikes and none of them is in perfect working order? Do you know how annoying it is to not know how to fix them yourself, even though you want to? And how much I want to scream when people, working at a bike shop, look at either a hub or bottom bracket of a 1976 Viscount, scratching their heads, saying they've never seen something like that in their life and don't know what to do with it? I've been the, admittedly proud, owner of Shawn since end of April but,  for the past two weeks, he's been sadly abandoned, because he was suffering major bottom bracket illness--one I couldn't fix since I had no idea how. In the meantime I had to acquire another Viscount since I need to get around London, you see? I also have another Viscount frame sitting in my bedroom, waiting to be brought back to life, and another frame is with a wonderful man, who's doing some CPR to it. Now this also costs a lot of money, you see? Money I don't necessarily have. But you, Universe, have a devillish merry time to make me go through all the suffering a non-experienced bike owner, now wanting to become a mech, apparently needs to go through. No need to ask you if you think it's funny; I can hear your laughter from there, wherever that is!
Up to yesterday, I was quite enjoying my new 'calling', but today, you went overboard, throwing some more obstacles in my way--for good measure, I assume--so that I not only hurt myself (the wrist's now swollen, I hope you're happy), but also question what I'm doing here, covered in grease. Thankfully, as I just learned, you only gave me a scare and I assembled the bottom bracket correctly, with the two grooves on the right side, but did you think it necessary, after two hours of hard work getting the job done, to make me give up because I only have a rubbish spanner to fit the cranks? Or was it you telling me that the work on the BB isn't done yet? Thanks a bunch. Had you made it slide in smoothly and right in place, this wouldn't have been necessary.
Yes, I'd love to be the woman, when it comes to Viscount bicycles, but can't you make it a tad easier for me? Can't you see, I'm working hard, learning fast and am trying my very best to get up to speed with all the information I can gather. Do you always have to make it so much harder for me? How about you throw a little bit of magic in my direction? That would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance. Tomorrow, I'll expect for everything to go easy. In fact, I'd like for the rest of my life to be a doddle. How's that, eh? And while you're at it, I'd like a few more grand so I can get some proper tools to get the jobs done. Don't forget one of those beautiful crank sets I'm after, okay, preferably with a bike attached to it. Just thought I'd mention it.

Chardonnay cheers,

Stella

Dear self-published author,

I don't care if you think your, your friend's, your husband's, your sister's, or your dog's book is the best thing ever been written; I'm not interested in reading it as I'm 99% sure that I'd stop reading after a few chapters. You know what really bothers me? People like you, who feel challenged by my statements that I'm done reading self-published books; and that you, cocky as you are, offer me a copy for free so I can waste even more time reading more drivel. You see, I doubt that your, your friend's, your husband's, your sister's, or your dog's book will be the book that grabs me by my throat and keeps me glued to my Kindle; the book that steals my sleep, or, when I wake up, has me excited to read on; the book that has me forget the world around me, leaving me dazzled when I'm forced to put it down when being dragged into the real world; the book that is the exception to the rule, the book that wakens the desire to tell everyone about it. Why can't you just accept that I'm done with self-published books after deleting more than I'd ever thought I would? Why do you have to try to convince me that I need to read your, your friend's, your husband's, your sister's, your dog's book? And what would you do if I read it and hated it? Huh? Or if I found all those little things that make self-published books unreadable for me? Tell me, what would you do then?
Quite frankly I don't care how much you love said book, or how many positive reviews it received, I'm not interested in reading it, got it?
And why, Indie author, do you feel the need to message me on Facebook, telling me that you've seen my comment about your book, which really was criticising your editor, who recommended it in the first place, and who did a marvellous job messing up the manuscript with so many italics and ellipses that even reading the opening made me dizzy, to tell me that you'll upload a newly edited version soon, suggesting I'd give it another chance? I'll let you in on an open secret: those kind of approaches don't sit well with me and have the opposite effect, and no, trying to be my friend won't lead to my changing my mind. I'm selective when it comes to my Facebook friends; authors usually mean spam fests and that's the last thing I want.
There, I said it. Thank you for your time and attention.

Best regards,

Stella

Tip of the week: how to react to negative reviews

Yes, I know, it's been done to death and I thought that everyone got the message after the Howett incident, but I seem to be wrong. I recently read a blog post giving some advice that had me fuming. Massively. The self-published author, who had obviously been spoiled by positive reviews (I assume by his friends), started to receive negative ones saying the story is unbelievable, characters not likeable, etc. So what did he do? He thought to himself that writing an article about the 'how to' would be a great idea. Yes, I agree, it is, but only if the 'how to' contains the following: be professional about it and take it on the chin.

Of course he didn't do that. No. He advised to look up your favourite authors' books and feel comforted when reading all the 1-star-reviews. Whereas it doesn't do any harm, it's pointless, because it doesn't make your book better, does it?
I won't repeat all the points, but stress the two that made me want to slap him. Hard. Very hard.
1.) He advised to get your mates to downvote the negative reviews and
2.) to ask as many friends as possible, who are confident to write a 5-star-review and, yes, you guessed it, get them to post them.
I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. Not only is this particularly immature, but also highly frowned upon, and that rightly so.

Needless to say that it didn't take long until he got his wrists slapped by fellow authors and readers who weren't too impressed with such advice. Serious self-published authors have enough difficulties without those who pull such stunts. People like that want to play professional in the professional league, but are still in kindergarten.
Now, I'm not so much concerned about people being vocal about it, they'll be put in their places in no time, but I'm worried about those who just go ahead and do it. Fair play to this particular author, though, he has amended that post. If he's also altered his way of thinking, I don't know.

I'd keep it simple: if you receive a negative review, rise above it. Not everyone will love or like your book. If you receive more or them, all pointing out the same issue, stop huffing and puffing and instead get cracking, they may be onto something.
The only response a reviewer deserves is: Thank you for taking the time to read my book.

Stop messing with the system just because you can do it. You want to be taken seriously? Then act like it!

Rant over!

About the unnecessity of prologues

Most of them, that is. I dislike those that were just added for the sake of it. Why would people do that? Prologues only have a place when they're relevant, for instance, when, in Fantasy or Science Fiction, characters of the here and now will appear in future and what they are discovering, the quarrels or change to the landscape they're in are important to the storyline which takes place either centuries or years ahead. 

Or, if it sets the scene for the whole book, referring to significant changes to the world the characters live in. That I will read with interest.

But too many times, prologues are either the back story of characters I don't even know yet, hence not really care about, or they are an excerpt of the novel, which spoils the plot for me. I want to read it and find out for myself.

In many cases, prologues can be avoided and easily interwoven in the actual book. Let me give you an example: I'm currently reading a book where the prologue shows a female dancer on the height of her career, just proposed by her long-term (extremely unlikable, arsehole) boyfriend, in a car, on the way to her parents, in a thunderstorm. They have an accident.

The actual story starts seven years later, she's not with that guy anymore and not an active dancer, but a dance teacher. The author is regularly referring to the past, to her ex, to the accident as it's the cause for her not being able to dance without pain anymore.
I keep wondering what purpose this prologue served. Those few pages could have easily been combined into two sentences of back story when we actually know more about that woman and how much dancing means to her, and the new man in her life, for that matter. If the author wrote, she danced with pain, the reader wonders why, and there she could've mentioned the accident. Simple and most effective.

And I read plenty of prologues like that. Redundant, in my opinion. If you need to write a prologue, do it because it would enhance the novel, needs to be there. Not because you like the word 'prologue' so much.

Indies, sometimes I just want to slap them!

Some people's actions leave me speechless. For a few seconds, then, I'll blow off. Seriously, only Indies can pull such stunts as I'll describe in the following.

A few days ago, a newly published author sent me a message on Twitter, asking if I'd be interested to promote his book on my blog via guest post or an interview.
To be honest, I was stunned. I don't know this person, I can't even remember to have ever conversed with him, neither do I remember when or why I followed him back. It was probably back in the earlier days, when I started my Twitter account and connected with everyone basically.I didn't know better back then. You probably guessed it, I unfollowed immediately. I mean, I know that we need to get word out there and promote like there's no tomorrow, but, seriously? Just 'attacking' random people you are connected with is definitely a sure way of annoying people. There are plenty of bloggers who promote Indies, who do interviews and have regular guest blogs. I don't! If you, Indie author, would have taken the time to look at my blog, you would know that! So why, Indie author, do you feel the need to ask me? What were you on that day?
Another example: there's a guy (author) on the Amazon forum, who regularly insulted people. When I told him that you shouldn't call people names, I ended up being insulted, too. Not only by him, but by his friend as well. (Apparently, I'm stupid.) So I told him I'm not going to converse with him any longer, which he agreed to. He recently popped on one of my threads where we had a discussion about the KPD-Select programme and its results and dumped a link to his book informing us that the updated version is now available. How obnoxious can a person be, I wonder. Maybe he wanted to annoy me -- in which he succeeded -- but it felt more like an attempt to get some downloads for his book.
That kind of desperation makes me want to slap them. Hard.
I've only ever 'promoted' one event: a few people who came together for a special occasion and I knew whom I'm helping.

If I wanted to promote someone, I'd approach them myself. But, hey, guess what? I've got three of my own books to promote, you see? And I'm not even doing that anymore like I used to do. Why? Because it's all a bit for nothing. Though it's fun to do guest posts and interviews and I'm always happy to do them, it didn't do anything for my sales and my theory is that it's mostly Indie authors who set up Indie promotion sites, which then often will resolve in Indie authors being the audience. There is one person, whose mere mention of my love for 2nd person POV in a pod cast had triggered some sales: Morgen Bailey, a fearless blogger, who does daily interviews, guest blogs, pod casts and more. And she's an author, too. Take a look at her page, if you're a reader, for many suggestions, and if you're an Indie, for being a guest on her site. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against them, I'm an Indie myself, but I want readers. Those who are not in the massive gum-like Indies bubble.
So, for that, I must write a book that's going to be read by readers and therefore I don't have time to promote my, let alone, other people's books.