Words by Sooz

“Story is more than plot, that it's the journey that matters, not how fast you arrive at your destination.”  - George R.R. Martin As I read this line a few days ago in Martin's “ Not a blog ,” I kept thinking about the latest story I read from K. Rowe, “Space Crazy. ” I enjoyed the short book, but to a point. There was something nagging at me for much of the book and even after I was done. After I read that line from Martin, it hit me. Space Crazy made it seem I was watching someone's life rather than living it and feeling what the main character, Dar, was going through in different stages of his life. There were so many different life events readers witnessed with his character. The book spanned about 10 years of his life. But only once was I ever really pulled into Dar's feelings. Even through death, leaving home for the first time and gaining the trust and friendship of people he cared about, Rowe didn't dig deep enough.

FutureBook caught up with Amanda Hocking recently and talked about going from a self-publishing platform to a traditional publishing house. Hocking has become a poster child for many indie authors, selling 1.5 million self-published eBooks. Although she has been successful in that realm, Hocking wanted to see her books in a traditional bookstore. She wanted to be in print. Hocking felt St. Martins Press was the best outlet for that – but it was not the highest bidder for her work. "Amazon actually was [the highest bidder] but I did not necessarily think they could get the books into the stores," Hocking told FutureBook. "I knew they could do good promotions for e-books, but what I really wanted was a publisher who could get the paperbacks into stores, and I didn't think they quite had the influence." One of the more interesting notes in the Hocking article was the different between freelance editors and those working in a publishing house. "Th...

I feel cheated. I spent an entire night reading Explosive Eighteen and at 6 a.m. when I finally put the proverbial book down, I simply shook my head. All the elements were there for - FINALLY - a fantastic Stephanie Plum novel by Janet Evanovich , but instead of digging deeply into the characters that many have fallen in love with, we were still left with so much surface nonsense. I wonder if the characters actually feel anything. Perhaps I'm being a bit too harsh, but there was no introspection. You would think after a woman has had her life flash before her eyes about a dozen times, she would at least get some clarity in her life. The book starts with Stephanie on the way back from Hawaii. I actually found the opening of the book to be a strange start because nothing really happens. She's on a plane. She's drunk and annoyed. But we find out something did happen and leads to the crazy run around Stephanie has to deal inevitably deal with. O.K. Fin...

There is a story in there, I promise. Even though I wasn't sure, I kept telling myself that and felt compelled to finish reading the short story,  The Soul Garden by Cege Smith. My hope was founded, once I got past the back story and extra words that it took to get there. The first part has too much information, at times going between memories, which created the opposite effect of I believe Smith was aiming. There was too much story to create tension. As readers open the book they met are with about five pages worth of back story and a little bit of action. No dialogue. There has to be good a balance of all of them and I believe a good editor would have been able to help Smith cut out the unnecessary parts to get to her story quicker and with much better pacing. The Soul Garden takes place in a society where people follow the rules of the governing body, The Office of Souls. Humans are born without souls and because of the limited number of souls, bab...

A little less than a year ago, Allen Schatz published his first book on Smashwords. Going the self-publishing route didn't come easy to him. He had an agent and when that didn't work out, Schatz took advantage of the growing industry. Since then he's become his own PR agent as well. In this Q&A, I talk to Schatz about marketing himself while trying to maintain his writing lifestyle and not letting his "real" job get in the way. Read the interview after the jump:

Amazon is facing a problem with self-publishers in the erotica section. There are also problems with plagiarism on the site, according to a report by Fast Company . Fast Company spoke to one person who has dealt with these issues, but wanted to remain anonymous because of her writings. She wants to keep that separate from her public life. However, the findings in the article are interesting. It's definitely worth checking out. There seems to be too much of this going on according to the findings in the article. This is a topic that is especially important with SOPA trying to gain traction in congress – although under the current form, it probably will never pass. “Legislation has been proposed that would give content holders more leverage in dealing with etailers: the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). It would award copyright holders wide-ranging powers to run websites that host infringing material off the Internet without needing to acquire a court order. If i...

I finally finished “ A Feast for Crows .” I stayed up until 4 a.m. to ensure I got it done. I couldn't go any longer without finishing. The only problem is I need to know what happens next. However, I'm going to wait on reading the fifth books in George R.R. Martin's series to get back into reading/reviewing. Also, I want to talk a little more about the self-published world as it exploded in 2011. The next book on the list is “ Game 7:Dead Ball ” by Allen Schatz . It's the first of three books in the Marshall Connors Series. The books follow a Major League Baseball umpire as he's engulfed in murders and mysteries. I learned about Schatz's books through Twitter . When I first started following him, he probably had around 1,500 followers. In a short time, he's has more than 10,000. While he spends his time writing, he also does a lot when it comes to promoting his books. That's one of the pitfalls of self-publishing, you're also a self...