Author Archives: Scott Jucha

Silver Ships – No Longer A Trilogy

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Originally, The Silver Ships was an extremely long outline that I cut into three parts…thus the Silver Ships trilogy. But, as I ‘m working on Méridien, the third book, while Libre is with my indie editor, I realize two things. First, I have ideas for more adventures for Alex and his people that won’t fit into the first three books. Second, I have grown quite fond of the people of the flotilla , and I’m not ready to say goodbye to them.

The continuing adventures of Alex and the Librans is in planning now. The present outline will generate a least one more book, Hellébore, but possibly it might generate two more books…for now.

Amazon #1 Bestseller: First Contact

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Amazon #1 Best Seller - First Contact Category

Amazon #1 Best Seller – First Contact Category

My Deepest Thanks To My New Fans!

I’m very humbled by the reception that my first novel, “The Silver Ships,” has received from fans around the world. I appreciate the individuals who have purchased my book or downloaded a Kindle version, many of who have contacted me and shared their impressions with me.

It never occurred to me while writing and publishing my book that on Tuesday, March 3, 2015, just twenty-four days after publishing, that I would access my Amazon book page at the urging of my sister Jan and discover my book labelled with the Amazon #1 bestseller flag for the category of science fiction, first contact.

My thanks again to all my new fans!

 

 

Salute to Goodreads

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Goodreads: Book reviews, recommendations, and discussion

One of the most wonderful sites I’ve ever found that is dedicated to readers is Goodreads.com.

The members of Goodreads are passionate about books and communicating with one another their preferences. You only have to read the reviews of a new book to realize how committed the members are to their shared passion—all things books!

The site allows inter-communications via email, members to follow others’ recommendations, and be-friend one another. Members have personal pages, and authors can build their own pages, linking their books, posting on an internal blog, and adding a review widget to their web site to name a few items.

I was able to start a dialog with many of the reviewers who showed an interest in character-driven, space-opera stories. This led to a priming-of-the-pump, so to speak, of my own novel before it was published on Amazon and has set the model for my future efforts.

To the members of Goodreads, I doff my hat. They are a superb bunch of people who care for the written word and the stories of authors.

 

“Libre”, Cover Art

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Alisha of Damon Za

Alisha of Damon Za

Alisha Of Damon Za has done it again!

Last year, I found the Damon Za web site that featured book covers at very reasonable prices. You only have to see their home page banner to see the quality of their work.

I was paired with Alisha, who created the cover for The Silver Ships. We did go back and forth for almost a month on that first cover. I created a rough design of the silver ship for her, which she transformed into the present image.

And, here’s the good part. I went back to Damon Za for the second cover (Libre, A Silver Ships Novel ) and requested Alisha for the work. After completing my order, I emailed Alisha my ideas for the cover based on a test cover she created for The Silver Ships. She nailed it the first time.

Her cover was exactly what I had in mind. Okay, so maybe my mental image was a little fuzzier than hers and maybe not as eye-catching, but you get the idea. Great job, Alisha!

“The Silver Ships” is Published!

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Published on Amazon!

Published on Amazon!

The Silver Ships was published on Amazon on  February 7th and is available in both Kindle and softcover versions. If you have Amazon Prime, the Kindle version is available for free download!

It took fifteen months from the time I sat down with my 100+ scraps of paper—character descriptions, technology and world concepts, chapter ideas, and smatterings of dialog—to write the story and work the review processes with my editor, Angela Polidoro.

At the heart of the story, I wanted to express my view that the individual counts, that an individual can make a difference. It’s a concept applied in my science-fiction stories, and it’s applied by people in the real world today!

e-Book Conversions

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 “Don’t Try This At Home”

…or so the warning goes. It applies equally well to the conversion of your finished book in Word or what-have-you into e-Book files of Mobi (Kindle) and ePub.

As a former IT professional, I intended to use a conversion program to create my e-book files until numerous Internet complaints about the software programs changed my mind. Instead, I sought professionals to do the job, and it was a good decision.

I’ve had the most satisfying experience working with Jason and Marina of Polgarus Studio. They’ve done a wonderful job of working through the conversion issues and helping me understand the differences in the e-book applications and formats. They’ve been a pleasure to work with while converting my novel, The Silver Ships. I’ll be using them for my next novel…and the next one.”

Crowd Funding

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Well, I can say that the crowd funding process for my series, The Silver Ships, was a learning experience. For me, it was not very successful, only about 11% of the target was collected. These are the points I might share:

  • Don’t use crowd funding for writing unless you have an established history as a published author.  Crowd funding appears to work best for products, inventions, software, etc.
  • If you have a large established social network, this may make crowd funding for a fiction or non-fiction novel possible to a limited extent.
  • If you do decide to launch a campaign, you will receive dozens of offers to promote your campaign. The three groups that I invested in were absolutely worthless.

Fiction Stories: Human Puzzles

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The other day, I was wondering why I was enjoying writing so much, especially since I was trying to solve a plot dilemma. Then it hit me. The story: plot turns and twists, characters and their relationships, and the unique and strange worlds is the ultimate puzzle.

I’ve always enjoyed puzzles. However, I was often unsatisfied after spending hours solving a complex one. Despite the effort, I felt nothing was achieved. It was just a mental exercise.

Creating a fiction novel, hopefully I will enjoy reading, seems to be the ultimate puzzle exercise. It’s a “human puzzle.” It’s wonderfully  complex and contains elements that can be combined in infinite variety.

The challenge is to weave the elements together in such a way as to create an enjoyable experience for the reader as the puzzle is unraveled page by page before their eyes!

ISBNs for Books

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Bowker Identifier Services

Every book requires an International Standard Book Number (ISBN). In the U.S., the ISBNs are purchased from Bowker Identifier Services. As the U.S. ISBN Agency, Bowker is the ONLY official source of ISBNs in the United States.

What shoudl be noted for all first-time self-publishers is that every version of your book: eBook, softcover, and hardcover needs its own ISBN. Furthermore, if you update the book, essentially creating a new version of the book, it requires a new ISBN.  Conveniently, you can purchase groups of ISBNs from Bowker.