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[Sci-Fi/Fantasy Magazines:]

Sorry guys accidentally wrote over my original post, which outlined the process of getting published in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy market.  Part of this process involves getting published in magazines, ebooks and entering contests.

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Magazines:
Here are some printed and electronic Sci-Fi/Fantasy Magazines that are accepting submissions.  Many Sci-Fi Mags have short life cycles. I you know a good Sci-Fi/Fantasy Mag please let me know.

(1) Realms of Fantasy (10,000 word limit)
http://www.rofmagazine.com/guidelines.html

(2) Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine (25,000 word limit)
http://www.sfsite.com/fsf/glines.htm

(3) Asimov's Science Fiction (7,000-12,500 word limit)
They accept boarderline fantasy my specialty
http://www.asimovs.com/info/guidelines.shtml

(4) Quantum Muse (8,000 words or serial stories)
http://www.quantummuse.com/

E-publishers for Sci-Fi/Fantasy are:

Twilight Times Books
www.twilighttimesbooks.com/subs.html (subs accepted July 15, Aug 5th 2004)

Mundania Press LLC (They also have big names here for ebook prices)
http://www.mundania.com/submissions.html

Runestone Publishing (specialize strictly in Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
http://runestonehill.com/submissions.htm

Double Dragon Ebooks
double-dragon-ebooks.com


Best Sci-Fi/Fantasy Writers Contest:
http://www.writersofthefuture.com/

Best Wishes,
Patricia

Dear Beth,

Alexandria seemed to be a hot spot during early Christianity.  I have a deep fascination with the history behind the Library of Alexandria.  I would be very interested in any comments or recommended reading you might offer on this topic.  

Below are some links on this topic:
http://www.askwhy.co.uk/christianity/0620Alexandria.html#The%20Decline%20and%20Destruction%20of%20the%20Pagan%20Schools%20in%20Alexandria

http://www.saintmark.com/topics/patrology/schoolofalex/I-Intro/chapter1.html

Regards,
timeless

[http://www.parapub.com]

Greetings Timless,

Thank you for your excellent information. There are a few comments I would like to add.

Most of the costs you note are based on the cost of marketing the book. In fact the price you quoted of $5000 is almost exclusively based on marketing the books to readers, stores etc.. Before I comment on that, I would just say that I do not see the necessity for the $600 insurance for returned books. The books are presumably returned to the retailer, and like everything else, they must return it to stock for resale.

On the marketing costs, it might surprise most people to learn that so called  "traditional publishers" do not generally make any effort to promote a book unless the author is a big name. The author is exected to promote their own books, notwithstanding the fact that they no longer even retain the rights to the book, and often receive less than $1 per book in royalties.

Therefore, regardless of the chosen publishing route, the book has to be promoted. I personally would not rely on any publisher, POD otherwise to promote and market a book. They might be good at publishing, but not at marketing. There are many ways of very effectively marketing a book by means of the vast reach of the Internet for example.

The choice between POD and traditional publishing is therefore reduced to more tangible factors, notably the initial costs involved, and the so called "vanity" factor. I personally think that "vanity publishing" is a derogatory term; how can anyone possibly judge the quality of a book in this way? There are many exceptional authors who simply do ny meet the requirements of "traditional" publishers, and therefore can only be published by POD methods. Even J.K. Rowling was rejected by 7 publishers! Robert recently told me that out of 2000 submissions, a publsiher might choose 1 single title for publication. My own view is that they will very often choose the wrong one, leaving many excellent authors without a publisher.

Now the important thing is; digital publishing is the future! Traditional publishing is archaic and inefficient both in terms of time, resources and money, and they make authors pay the price. Offset printing is about as modern in this day and age as a Model T Ford [] Even the famous Oxford and Cambridge Presses are using digtal publishers now rather than using their own offset typing resources.  The quality of a digitally printed book is higher then a traditionally printed one from what I have seen, and that is what matters to the author and the reader alike.

Traditional publishers will do everything they can to keep their old industry alive, including it seems slurring the modern publishers and their authors with such titles as "vanity publishing". This is extremely arrogant on the part of "traditional" publishers, because they are basically saying that the authors they choose are the "real authors", and everyone else is being vain!  That is clearly very arrogant, biased on largely incorrect view. I would certainly question that attitude based upon some of the dubious authors they do select, and in particular the many potential best selling authors they reject.

In summary, AuthorHouse and similar are an excellent route. The publish top quality books and distribute them to the same outlets as so called "traditional" publishers. The book is as a high in quality if not higher quality than a "traditionally printed" book, so the reader is happy. The costs only mount up if using AuthorHouse own marketing systems, but I would suggest they are not required anyway, and therefore it is not a relevant factor.

No author should be called "vain" by the snobbishness of protectionist industries, just because they want to see their hard work in print for people to read and benefit from.

One day soon, the "traditional" authors will have to modernise themselves and use digital printing or go extinct, when they do they will be indistinguishable from the current, modern, digital publsihers, and they will no longer talk of "vanity publishing".

For anyone interested in self-publishing, here is an excellent site:

http://www.parapub.com

With best regards,

Adrian.

Great topic!  And yes, a very controversial one at that!![]

I have some things that I wrote on this somewhere, I will look for it and post it soon!  Being on this board has really made me wish that I had organized things on my hard drive a little differently![:O]

But I will post on this soon...

Thanks for the support, and thanks for the question!![]

Judgeing by coments you made about my bestfriend's decesed wife you delud yourself with what you think love is, dont kid yourself you think you know it all because youve cramed your brain full of books wrighten by humans on our plain and then listen to everyoneelses experainces and think that you know it all, you know nothing but therory, and since you lost you little friend who liked hurting people like you youve got a bit upset and tryed hurting myn in the sickest way posible.
Dont even think you have the slightest clue about what love is...

im sorry you lost your little friend now who will you hurt people with. frowing yourself around because your a gold memeber lol dont mean nothing to nobody.....

Hi timeless,

They do get a bad rap, its true, but I can say my mother-in-law is a sweetheart. Anyway, if I find a joke I'll post it, but meanwhile have a good visit. []

Very best,

So the things you describe are from an actual place then?
What was it?  []

If you listen to Coast to Coast AM, callers call in every single night with stories like that. It's like Noory always says: someone 'up there' is watching out for you. Maybe you should call in to Coast to Coast one night and tell your story, Timeless. The calls are totally toll free, though it may be long distance.

quote:Originally posted by timeless

Goingslow, as usual got me thinking.  

New Age ideas started out as a fresh look at old concepts.  These New Age ideas formulated itself into a philosophy and now I feel they are starting to structure and harden themselves into a religion.  

What are your thoughts on this?

My thoughts are that:
(1) Religions have a lot of rituals and rules.  
(2) Rules are like wallpaper or pretty clothing.  
(3) True spirituality is an individual truth that grows with beauty inside and spills out.  I do not see it as rules which followed constrict and mold us into what someone elses image is of God like nature.
(4) Rules have a small place (what we eat, the music we listen to, the clothes we wear etc.) but I see them as fine adjustments on a microscope.  You can have a lot of fine adjusting rules and what is under the microscope will still look fuzzy. Coarse adjustments on self (from within) usually bring greater clarity.
(5) To me New Age philosophy is a large pool of ideas to help us learn about and clearly see ourselves.  It would be sad if it just turned into another religion.

Regards,
timeless

I think you're really onto something here.

Thanks for this post timeless.

I pretty much agree with that completely.  Here are some links with similar thoughts.  The specifically talk about individual chakras but they support what you are saying timeless.

This one is for the root chakra
http://www.spiritonline.com/files/messages/16/400.html?0

This one is for the solar plexus chakra
http://www.spiritonline.com/files/messages/16/398.html?0

This one is for the throat chakra
http://www.spiritonline.com/files/messages/16/396.html?0

This one is for the brow chakra
http://www.spiritonline.com/files/messages/16/395.html?0

Finally is the crown chakra
http://www.spiritonline.com/files/messages/16/394.html?0

But unfortuneately the other 2 chakra's pages really don't have similar discussions about what happens when energies mix.

timeless,

Best to you in your work project. We'll miss you here.

Looking forward to your return [].

Very best,

Hi Timeless:

I took a peek at the chakra website and I know I will be going back. It looks like a good one. Thanks.

Thanks for sharing those dreams timeless. You appear to get a lot of lucid dreams and seem to have excellent dream recall (I'm jealous []). Do you keep a dream journal? I haven't done that, but have read where it helps with recall.

Very best,

Hi.

Excellent idea Timeless.

"There is only one thing faster than the speed of light,
and that is the speed of doubt." - 'Sandman'.  'Good News Week'.]

"The period of greatest gain in knowledge and experience is the most difficult period in one's life. Through a difficult period you can learn, you can develop inner strength, determination and courage to face the problems." - The Dalai Lama.

Got heaps more if you want them. LOL

Love always.

1)no
2)no
3)no
4)no
5)no

but thats ust what i think

Four hours?!?! Wow, that's huge!
I can only remember two lucid dreams. The first was the longest at (from what i can remember) about one or two minutes. The second lasted about twenty seconds. It was a great twenty seconds though, considering i made my cat fly []

Hello again timeless,

Well, I have yet to get much time to read through your story so far, but I have copied and pasted all of it in a word document so I can go through and read it at my leisure.  I will make notes in the file and post it in its own topic here with everything that I thought about it, including thoughts that I have along the way, that way you can see if I am getting what you want me to get out of it along the way.  I will be as critical as I can don't worry.  I will hopefully have it up for you tomorrow.

Respectfully,
Links Shadow

(1) Did I tone down the adjectives enough?

I never saw the original post, so I don't know what it was like.  I think that the thoughts were clear and concise.

(2) Was it clear my guy in the white robe was not hovering in an aircraft but instead was an astral entity? I hope mentioning he is ghost-like is enough?

Since we are all members of this forum and interested in the astral it was easy for me and most likely others of this site to identify that the entity in the white robe was in fact an astral being of some kind.  I do feel though that by stating that he was like a ghost is enough even for those not well read about the astral to convince them that he is not a physical being.

(3) Did the details about the grandmother situation effectively setup some rules for my astral guy. For example making it acceptable that he could turn off the light switch?

When reading this passage I did not pick up on the fact that the grandmother was there to set up some guidelines by which the white robed being should follow.  I instead thought of her as being there to help Christa accept the fact that there are things that can not be easily explained and that there are always people looking out for you.

(4) When I switched from viewing the story from inside the astral guy to viewing from inside Christa, did you feel lost for a moment? Or was it an easy transition -- easy to understand?

I found the transition very easy to follow.  I never thought that what was happening to her was what he was seeing.

(5) What do you think Christa's future holds? The answer to this question tells me if I setup correctly reader expectation for the rest of the novel.

After reading this passage I began to think of Anikin Skywalker from Star Wars who is said to be the one who will bring balance to the force.  Someone whose natural talents will play a vital role in the struggle of good vs. evil.  I am guessing that this is kind of the role of Christa, someone with incredible abilities that need to be discovered.  Because the white robed man was working with her I am obviously thinking that she will fight for good.  She will obviously be facing many struggles, and I believe many of them will involve people she is close to.  I don't see her as being the classic lone wolf type of hero.

(6) Please point out anything you feel is amiss, including; spelling, grammar, diction.

I did not find any problems such as this, but I will look over it again when I have more time and let you know if I find anything.

I hope my input helps you out, and I can't wait to read the rest of the story as it is very entertaining.

Respectfully,
Links Shadow

timeless

you can see my reply on the "call to order" forum.

Here is a site which is poorly laid out as you will notice immediately when you see it, but it contains decent information on just about everything related to writing including the publishing process.

http://www.capcollege.bc.ca/dept/cmns/fwp.html

Scene & Structure by Jack M. Bickham.
38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes by Jack M. Bickham

Elements of Style by Strunk&White

2cents & L&L
jouni

Thanks for the link timeless! []

Is it fine to use them in dialogue?

[Ugh I can't stand JK Rowling... The whole Harry Potter fad is killing me. I never liked the concept of the book in the first place. Then it spread...like wildfire. It'll die down, like everything else does.So anyway what I think is missing from books these days is pictures. Kids hate reading details (I know I did). If you describe something but portray no visual image, the mental image of whatever it is can be distorted beyond reasoning. You have to give the kid piccys man! That and definitions of the "big" words in the back.~Squeek]

Ugh I can't stand JK Rowling...  The whole Harry Potter fad is killing me.  I never liked the concept of the book in the first place.  Then it spread...like wildfire.  It'll die down, like everything else does.

So anyway what I think is missing from books these days is pictures.  Kids hate reading details (I know I did).  If you describe something but portray no visual image, the mental image of whatever it is can be distorted beyond reasoning.  You have to give the kid piccys man!  That and definitions of the "big" words in the back.

~Squeek

try to see 12:34:56. A whole minute is too easy.

G'day Timeless!

First, an appology.  I kind of accidentally deleted the other topic in Astral Chat.... groan.  I posted a couple of extensive posts and then a friend turned up and distracted me while I was trying to fix the formatting on the outline article, and I pushed the wrong button and 'poof!' the topic was gone forever, lost in the astral realm of good intentions.

To get published these days is very difficult.  Most writers can paper a wall in rejection slips before they get seriously published. And unfortunately, 99.99% of writers give up long before this happens.

I got a rejection slip once, but only because the publisher was swamped on books they had to produce.  I sold the book the very next try.

What you need is a plan.  Many fine books are rejected simply because the author is unknown, and it would thus be difficult to market their books.  Because of this, tis advisable to seek to become known beforehand.  This is best done by writing and placing articles and short stories, and by winning awards. This is a kind of invisible apprenticeship.

Added to this, the writing discipline must of course be gained. This is the force that drives one back to one's keyboard every day.

As for the outline method, I'll repost it soon as I fix the formatting, which is crucial.

But its fine to use other methods, as long as they are clear and easy to understand at a glance. For fiction, it can be better to include a mini synopsis for each chapter.

Yes, I think the E book idea is good. Writers can also do same on amazon.com and etc.  

As for agents, hmmm, yes, there are loads of flakey ones around that are more interested in taking your money than marketing your books. Most of those that charge a monthly fee are suspect.  The most a 'real' agent will do is ask for a reading fee, to cover their time reading an ms and deciding if they will take it up and etc. After this, a real agent will wear all costs as this is part of what they do for their eventual percentage.

More later........

Take care, Robert.

Dead cert - dead certain
I've never used it but I assume that's what it means.
Gormless Wuss - silly person? ( I really liked this saying )
Well...wuss is very common, and means 'coward' or 'chicken' Gormless is pretty irrelevant, and I've never heard it next to wuss. Means stupid or blank.
knackered - very tired?
Yes. Always used.
beast - ugly
Sometimes.
brill - for brilliant or excellent ( I like this )
No. That's so famous five.
cabbage - for someone slow or foolish
.....never heard of that use before.

Hope I've been of help! [|)]

Thank you timeless, yes if I have any more questions I will certainly pm you.  I spent about 5 nights working on grounding alone without the stones and as I reported earlier I was definitely feeling some very strong sensations going up my spine.  I attempted to keep the energy surges down with some difficulty.  Once I started using the stones though I found keeping the energy down around my lower chakras was much easier, but the sensations are just as strong.

Once again thank you for your time.  I will continue to experiment a little bit, and will contact you if I have any questions.

Regards,
Links Shadow

I read somewhere in the NEW SCIENTIST article that a scientist has sucessfully break the Heisenberg's uncertainty principle using the so called weak measurement. The results are bizzare indeed. The overlapping particle and antiparticle don't anhilate each other and that region of space of two overlapping particle has probability of occurence NEGATIVE one.

timeless,

I ordered this book the other day from Amazon. It looks like it will be a fascinating read. However, I have to confess I have no idea what Shadow work is. Maybe it was mentioned at the book site and I overlooked it, not sure. Can you give a nutshell version of what Shadow work means? Thanks in advance.

Very best,

.

How about "Timeless". No, that's not a pen name.

Try Elyssa Grand, or Elisabeth Night. [8D]

Don't you mean the former is the better of the two?

Good and bad are not separate. Both exists as results of the other.
And that is the result of good and bad ultimately being the same thing. The difference is the result of an action's manifestation on the physical.
Ok, that's not really a good reply, I'm having a bit of a hard time with words these days.

Good to have you back Timeless!!

2cents & L&L
jouni

Okay. Have fun outside. Maybe when you return I can ask what you originally meant, if the subject comes up again. I really wanted to know.

thnx timeless.  that was kick-butt.

Thanks for the link, Timeless! Zen is awesome.

Greetings Timeless!

"Remote Viewing" is a rather ambiguous name for the ability to which it refers, because in actual fact there is no visual feedback at all normally. Remote Viewing is purely the ability to receive "impressions" and to transmit them to paper by means of symbols.  Some remote viewers sometimes, but rarely, recieve visual impressions as well, but this is considered to be exceptional.

I would describe what your were experiencing as Clairvoyance, and I am sure you could see the images in colour should you wish to.

They do sound like very interesting experiences indeed, and with Clairvoyance you can certainly scry the future as well as present and past.

With best regards,

Adrian.

Wow, very interesting page.  I've never read any Zen philosophy before but have always been really big on open mindedness.  

Just wish I could make my girlfriend read and understand this page.  She's the type of person that would read it and say, "Hmm, weird." and walk away without a second thought.

I guess we can only work on ourselves and our own spiritualality (spelling).

I might have to look for more Zen related topics now that you've dipped me into that pool.  

Thanks for the interesting link!  [^]

Timeless: You present some rather kind words for which I am grateful.

Yours,
Frank

tube type obe's? i have never heard of such things, could you explain this more please.