An Abundance of Things

WOW, a lot has happened since my last post! I feel bad for falling so far behind. I hope you guys will forgive me! I'll just do my best to make up for it with an intense post. How does that sound? And to get you guys excited, there is going to be some REALLY AWESOME NEWS about a certain sale going on at the end of this post. And maybe a funny picture or two for you. Maybe.

First order of business: New author photos! I got a few pictures taken, that now are on the back cover of The Dreamers Second Edition, and The Nightmarers as well. New author photos on ALL the books!

 Next order of business: This little award! The Idaho Book Extravaganza, a program held every year to help educate and support authors, writers, publishers, readers, and books of Idaho, holds an awards ceremony every year. They award people who produce the best books, covers, interior design, and more in Idaho. These award categories are split into subsections for fiction and nonfiction. This year, The Dreamers Second Edition won an "Honorable Mention" for Idaho's TOP 10 FICTION BOOKS!

Many other extremely talented writers and inspiring people were awarded at the event. Lots of hard work went into the event, and it was a great success. Everybody in and out of this picture is fantastic. 

(And I'm not excluding you, dear reader).

Can you find me in the picture? Where's Waldo Oliver? :)

Earlier, I had the opportunity to speak at my local library for a few minutes on self-publishing, and how I published my books. It was pretty fun, and also inspiring to see young kids interested in how to accomplish something. (Back in June, I taught a week-long publishing course at CSU to kids of the same age group for the second time, which was also a LOT of fun!)

And on to more recent news, (as in, earlier TODAY news...)

I finished NaNoWriMo! 50,000 words in the month of November. This is my second consecutive win, third win overall, and fourth year participating! More information on the book I wrote for NaNo (and am continuing to write!) can be found here.

The moral of this post:

BONUS CONTENT: ("But wait, there's more!)

Do you know what this is? This is the schedule for my Kindle Countdown Deal! (Cyber Monday, Holla!) Next to the date, it has the price that the book will be on that date. This means that on December Second, you can get The Dreamers for just 99 CENTS! Each following day will add a dollar to the price until it's back to its normal price. (So hurry, before the price goes up!) Here's where the SPECIAL part comes in! The Nightmarers will have the same deal going on at the same time. So you could pick up the entire series so far for less than the price of ONE of them normally!

Just like last time, with great power savings, comes great responsibility. Well, not really. But it sure would be nice if you could leave a nice review of both books on Amazon, and share the deal with your friends! This helps lead to more sales later down the road, so I can afford to keep writing and entertaining and stuff. I don't want a deskjob. Or a job at McDonalds. Or Burger King. (Though Wendy's wouldn't be that bad, would it?) This promo helps you get a great deal, and if you help me out a little in return, helps me out a LOT!

Thanks, you guys are awesome! Stay sweet!

Dream on!

Oliver Dahl

&

Sam Kullen

"LIES" Completion, Covers, and Thankfulness!

Hello, Dreamers! It's Thanksgiving Break, and that means I'm working on The Nightmarers for you guys, and then finishing up a few other stories I can't wait to publish! This includes Lies, my historical fiction novella about the Salem Witch Trials.

I finished writing it yesterday evening, weighing in at an impressive 25,000 words long! (Or over 100 print pages). Since I have written it for NaNoWriMo, that number was written entirely in 15 days--half of the month of November! Looking back, I am shocked that I was able to write so much! Proud, for sure, but surprised I was able to!

I can't wait to get it edited and out to you guys, (after The Nightmarers, of course!) I don't know if I have ever been so excited and firm about the storyline before... Everything seems to click with me in the story, and so I just can't wait for you guys to be able to feel that excitement about it, too!

In the meantime, I have created a few basic cover designs for this book. None of them are final, and all are certainly open to criticism and advice.

If you guys would tell me which of them you like the best, that would be awesome! Any additional info abut why, of other advice would be great too, but isn't required. :)

 

Thanks for your support guys, I'm very thankful for it! Speaking of thankfulness... It's Thanksgiving Break here in Idaho, so... What are YOU thankful for?1, 2, 3 or 4? Any advice? Criticisms?

Leave your favorite cover's number, and/or what your thankful for in the comments below! I would love to hear what you guys have to say!

 

Oliver Dahl

 

NaNoWriMo and More 2012!

Wow! It's that time of year already! November! And with it, the holidays, and NaNoWriMo! I'll spare you an immediate explanation in this post, but if you want to learn more about what the heck NaNoWriMo is all about, check this out!

This November is a special time for me, because it marks two years since the initial writing process of The Dreamers. It is crazy to think that two years ago I sat down at my computer, locked myself in my room, and cranked out a novel in just a month! Something I failed to do the next year.

This NaNoWriMo also marks my 3rd year participating! I didn't learn my lesson the first time, I guess. Last year I wrote part of an unsuccessful draft to a book that takes place in modern days underneath the catacombs in Paris, France. I haven't done much ith that story since, but I am still really eager to really start on it and finish it up. I think it will show the best of my writing yet, and be an epic story, while being massively entertaining at the same time. I am just really excited in general to get that out to you guys.

Of course, there's also the series I began working on in 4th or 5th grade. I have done even less with this story, but I still love everything about it, despite it's 6th grade writing style. Due to its massive size, weighing in at over 100,000 words, or 550 pages, I am somewhat afraid of returning to it. All in due time, I suppose.

Though these stories are temporarily postponed and in the past, I have been working on getting The Nightmarers out to you guys. I am so close to finishing, I can see the end result! I am so excited for you guys to read it!

However, for NaNoWriMo, I am putting other writing aside to begin something else. (I will still try my best to get further editing complete, however. Don't you worry about that!) I am hoping to complete writing the first draft during NaNoWriMo, and then work on polishing it up in my spare time. Are you ready??

Lies - an in-depth novella immersing the reader into a world of witchcraft and trials, truth and lies, spectral horrors and shocking truths about Salem during the 1690's.

What do you think? I'm equally excited about writing this one, and seeing as I'm planning to make it shorter, I think it will be easier to control and edit, and will make a nice $.99 read on your kindle.

Off to other news, I am planning a very exciting progressive release party for The Nightmarers... Right here on TheDreamersAdventures! Every week or so, I will release a chapter excerpt from The Nightmares until its release, counting down the weeks with exciting new content until The Nightmarers becomes internationally available!

Before I end, I would like to thank Helena Martin for taking this picture of The Dreamers at a large bookstore here in Idaho (and a few surrounding states). It's always exciting to realize that your book is selling in a place you weren't aware.

 

I look forward to sharing my future writing with you!

Dream on!

Oliver Dahl

 

NaNoWriMo

It's a big word. It's a confusing word. It gets the best of us saying, "NaNo--what?!" It causes even the greatest of authors to shudder with horror. (Or laugh aloud in joy, depends.) It's... NaNoWriMo.

What is NaNoWriMo? NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writers Month... (the first 2-3 letters from each word, not just NNWM. NaNoWriMo is just more fun to say.) But what IS it? It is a program that challenges writers nation and world-wide to write a novel in a month. The month of November, to be exact.

NaNoWriMo challenges writers, authors, and anyone with a novel in them to write that novel! For the adult program, (http://www.nanowrimo.org/) these writers must attempt to write 50,000 words in ONLY the month of November. 50,000 words, as far as I can tell, is about 200-400 pages long in a printed book. For the kids, us young writers get to choose and set our word count goal. Whether that's 10,000 words, or 45,000... whatever the number may be, we have to try and write that many words... in a month.

Why would anyone do such a crazy thing? Well, to be honest, I don't know. Maybe because it's a lot of fun! (With the right mentality, believe me, it is!) Or, maybe because it's a cool bragging right! Not many people can say that they've written an entire book in a month! Or maybe, for some, it is simply something to cross off of their "Wanna do" list.

As for me... I don't know why I did NaNoWriMo. I suppose because it sounded like a fun challenge. Maybe it was for the bragging rights. I don't know. But I did it... and I'm very glad that I did last year! Between the end of the 5th grade, to Christmas Break during 7th grade, I was rewriting one of my unpublished books out there. (It's still in the works.) When I finished, (on the winter solstice, actually!) it was over 550 pages long. Unfortunately, as I began to read back on this book during this school year, 8th grade, I discovered that my writing skills had become a lot better than when I had written them. I discovered that I needed to re-write the entire 550 page manuscript, one chapter at a time. I was extremely fond of this book, and wanted it to be the best it could be before I turned it in to a publisher. Wait... what does this have to do with NaNoWriMo you ask?

Well... nothing really. This just goes to show how NaNoWriMo changed my life. If it weren't for this crazy program, I would still be re-writing this long book. Because of NaNo, I was inspired to write another book. Eventually, my NaNoNovel was published, thus making me a 13 year old author. The Dreamers was the novel that I wrote in ONE MONTH last year. (I know, I still can't believe it!) It inspired me to take a break and write something else. Because I DID write something else, I have had a wonderful ride this fall and now winter season. (Thank you NaNoWriMo!)

For you writers reading this post... you really should look into NaNoWriMo! The adult NaNo link is above, the kids page for NaNo can be found at http://ywp.nanowrimo.org/. I found this program to be a ton of fun in 2010. Think of it this way: even if you don't complete the novel in a month... aren't you that many hundred or thousand words further along than you would have been if you HADN'T participated?

This year, so far, (the 28th of Nov.) I haven't yet passed 10,000 words. I'm being honest. My goal is 30,000 words. I still have to multiply my word count by 3 in order to meet my goal. In two days. I'll definitely be in Boise's "Last Minute Brigade".   : )

Dream on! Write on!
Sam Kullen
&
Oliver Dahl

Holiday!

Hello, Dreamers of the world!

I apologize for not posting in a while, and not even posting consistently & regularyly. Now, for the holiday season, (already, can you believe it!?!) I will post once every two weeks. Every other week. And... hopefully consistently afterward at the beginning of the respective week. I look forward to hearing from you, and hopefully, you, I.

In addition to the holiday season, it is NaNoWriMo again! For those who don't know... NaNoWriMo is the program in which I wrote The Dreamers... a program that challenges writers all over the nation and world to write a novel... in a month! This proved to be a LOT of fun last year, (Trust me, you have to have quite a bit of insanity in you for it to be fun... let alone to participate!) So... I am doing it again this year. My word count goal is quite a bit higher than last year, and I am giving myself more of a challenge. This Wednesday, November 16th, I will be signing books for a NaNoWriMo Midway Day party to help celebrate being halfway done with NaNoWriMo. (Though in my case, NOT my book! I still have a few tens of thousands of words to go...) This year, I am writing a book entitled, Beneathe. Yes. It is spelled funny on purpose. : )

This book takes place underneath the city of Paris, France. Under the Eiffel Tower, the sewers, the trains, the catacombs... there is an unknown world inhabited by strange creatures, in strange lands. Ian Grant gets thrown into this setting by a cereal box. He won a trip to Paris sponsored by the cereal box company, and soon finds himself deeper than anyone before into the mystery, danger, and horror of this world. He is enslaved, freed, challenged, and sent on quest after quest to save this world... and his life.

I am very exited about this book. (Thank you SO MUCH to Evan Lenn, who gave the original idea for this story to me. I hope to use it well!) This will definitely take a lot longer than a month to write. Maybe the first draft... but the final draft will take several months, if not years. There is so much that can happen in this book... It could be hundreds of pages long! (Over 500, at least!)

Thanks for reading! I hope you will look forward to future posts as much as I do!
Dream on!
Sam Kullen
&
Oliver Dahl