http://www.alanbaxteronline.com According To Me Fri, 03 Jul 2009 04:51:48 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en David B Coe is the author of the Crawford Award-winning fantasy The LonTobyn Chronicle, Winds of the Forelands and Blood of the Southlands. He's also, I'm honoured to say, a good friend of mine. I was reading his blog recently and came across a post informing people that a short ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/07/02/quality-short-story-david-coe.html I read an article in The Sydney Morning Herald today that talked about a poll conducted by Galaxy. They asked 400 people in Sydney and Melbourne aged over 16 to spell eight commonly mis-spelled words. The words in question were: embarrass accommodation accessory February guarantee opportunity eighth receipt According the article, people should be red faced about their inability ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/29/spelling-fear-technology.html First off, thanks to all of you that took the time to vote for me in the recent Editor Unleashed Flash Fiction 40 competition. I am very pleased to say that I won a place in the top 40. I didn't win first prize, but out of 280 entries it's ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/29/editor-unleashedsmashwords-flash-fiction-40.html My short story "Crossfire", which was recently published in The Oddville Press magazine, has been added to the Dark Shorts page here. Rather than reprint the story on my site like I usually do, I've made a direct link to the PDF file of the magazine in question. It's a ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/28/crossfire-added-dark-shorts-page.html You may remember that I entered a flash fiction piece in a competition organised by Editor Unleashed and Smashwords. I asked you to go and have a read and vote for me. Well, my story currently has 65 votes and a rating of 3.12 out of 5. That's not a bad ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/25/chance-vote-anthology.html I often wonder just how much all my online effort pays off. On the one hand, I see the hits this site gets (over 5,000 a month) and, even though people seem reluctant to comment much, it's a very well-traversed corner of the interwebz. And I like it here, so ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/24/power-blogging-social-media.html I'm very pleased to announce that another piece of my short fiction has been published out there in the real world. This particular story is a whimsically existential idea called Crossfire, published by The Oddville Press. Who are they? According to them: The Oddville Press is a downloadable electronic non-profit magazine ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/22/short-story-published-oddville-press.html No, sadly not for me. But whoever said that traditional publishing is dead had better think again. I've said myself that traditional publishing is dying. The whole nature of publishing is changing, and changing rapidly. But here's proof that the old models aren't going anywhere any time soon. I've picked up ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/22/ten-year-10-book-million-quid-deal.html For all you US based indies out there, take a look at this. The first Self-Publishing Book Expo is in New York on November 7th 2009. There are all kinds of things going on, incluing panels like Understanding Distribution, The Rise of eBooks, Buzz Your Book and more to be announced. ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/22/selfpublishing-book-expo-2009.html So, for those of you with a fairly short memory, I mentioned back on June 9th that there was a new day to celebrate. It's Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers' Day, and it's today - June 23rd. This post may be dated June 22nd, but that's what you get when ... http://www.alanbaxteronline.com/2009/06/22/sff-writers-day-2009.html