I got impatient and published a bit earlier than originally intended. So I’m probably not going to put up the 5th and 6th chapter now, mainly because I’m a tad worried about Amazon’s attitude. All my stories and novels are in the KDP Select program which means they should not be available anywhere else, and as long as Amazon Kindle is the only platform for them I will keep them in Select. About four chapters is what is available with the peek in function on Amazon so maybe it’s better to stick to that.
Now the more widely the stories are available the better it is is the general recommendation which I agree with and I have every intention to get mine on other ebook platforms, and as PODs and audiobooks, but I’m in no hurry and I think it will probably be a bit easier to do more at a time. I have learned the imobi conversion, but even with that things seem to change a little bit every time I do it so it always takes some time, so I’d rather spend the time to learn the others at a time when I can then spread wider at one stroke. Maybe when I have about five novels or so. Which I might get to even by the end of this summer if I stay busy. I have been writing for a while, and while ‘Fourth Sword’ was the only whole novel I had ready and so took only some heavy editing, I have several of these part done ones, three about half written, of which one is almost written but with some connecting scenes and the end missing, and a few more where I have written some key scenes and have a pretty good idea of the plot. Two of them are science fiction, of the space opera type, one is a sequel to ‘Fourth Sword’, other a sequel to ‘The Demons of Khemas’, and the third a novel length story of the Wampyrs (but that has to wait until I have written the two short stories which should come before it). And there are also a few almost done short stories. So yes, I think that for the immediate future I will concentrate on writing more stories and leave the published ones just to KDP, and during that time they will stay on the Select program. And then starting either next winter, or some time during the year after that, I will for a little while use my time to learning those other conversions and doing them.
But, for now, may I present: Fourth Sword, a portal fantasy novel about a down on her luck Finnish-American woman who gets yanked into a world where everything she ever dreamed of is real, and finds she’d much rather had kept on just watching all that on the silver screen or reading about them in books since when monsters and enemy soldiers who have never even heard of the Geneva Conventions exist having just swords to fight them is not much fun – even less for somebody who has never learned how to use a sword, and is just an out of shape woman (I do have a few very good female warriors here, but lets face it, when it comes to physical fighting women are at a disadvantage, and while there are always outliers in a pre-gunpowder society they would have to be something of a rarity. And since I have always rather disliked the miraculous upgrades unless they really are magic Laura gets none. She will, however, learn some magic and get in shape – running around and existing mostly on travel rations for several months would be liable to do that ;)).
And yep, I’m not particularly good with the picture manipulation programs, only decent addition to the picture I managed with that were those light splotches. They do, however, fit the world of the novel. Well, one more thing I should learn better.
Oh dear, this self publishing hobby is full time work, especially when you are trying to do all of it yourself – writing, painting, learning how to use all these damn computer programs… 😀 If this ever starts to get where I might be tempted to give up my day job, well, that would have to be good enough money that I can both live on it comfortably and be able to hire pros to do about everything else but the writing part, and maybe the painting although I would probably then keep that as a separate hobby. I’m decent but there are lots better cover artists around so I would probably rather use their work if I could afford to pay for that.
Northern dreaming 
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