Jeff Haws

Independent author

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Archives for June 2017

Does the book’s title really matter?

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I had this discussion on Facebook recently, as I consulted with various people on what the title of my upcoming novel should be. On my first book, once “Killing the Immortals” came to me, it was one of those proverbial light bulbs popping up above my head. Maybe literally. I can’t say for sure. But it was fairly bright in the room at the time, so perhaps.

Anyway, I knew right away that was the title. It was striking, a little mysterious, and had a seemingly contradictory nature that I liked. I love forcing readers to ask themselves a question they can only answer by reading whatever it is I wrote. “How can you kill immortals?” Know how you’re gonna find out? Buy my book and read the thing, damn it. [Read more…] about Does the book’s title really matter?

Three mistakes I made with my first book

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While my next novel faces my editor’s red pen, I’ve been thinking about how to make this next book release better than my first one. Not that it was a disaster or anything, but I figure I should always try to improve. When you’re a self-published author, it’s all on you. So if you don’t find ways to improve, nobody’s gonna do it for you, and there’s plenty of competition ready to lap you if you’re moving slow.

So, I was looking back at what I did for that first book release, and I picked out three mistakes I want to make sure I don’t replicate. And, hey, if you’re an author, maybe you can learn from my stupid mistakes so that you don’t make the same ones. Because I’m a helper. [Read more…] about Three mistakes I made with my first book

What does an editor do?

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Been a busy month or so. Spent two weeks wandering around Europe, and worked through the beta-reader edits on my next novel. Just sent it off to my professional editor yesterday, and that means we may see a final product around the beginning of August. You guys may get your hands on this book yet.

Just as I did shove my book out of its protective little nest, I ran across this terrific breakdown of how to pick an editor from the endlessly helpful Shayla from Curiouser Editing. It really goes into detail on what an author needs to be thinking about as he makes the fateful decision on who will be his manuscript’s bridge from being a crappy rough draft no one should have to read to being a publishable book that people might actually pay money for. [Read more…] about What does an editor do?