Monthly Archives: January 2016

Sharing secrets: Prequel to series “A Life Upside Down” is out, and we are going to celebrate it

January 31, 2016Books I write, Special Offers, Writingvica

A secret surprise. I’ve pressed “Submit for Publishing” twice today. Once with Kindle Direct Publishing (e-book) and once with CreateSpace (paperback).

Both for the prequel to the series “A Life Upside Down”. It is a short story and its title is “Seven Broken Pieces”.

You can find its description here or directly on Amazon.com.

The first book in the series “A Spy’s Daughter” was published shortly before Christmas.

How it feels. I’ve published “The Truth About Family” during the night and “A Spy’s Daughter” during the day. It is three o’clock in the morning as I write this, which is less than half an hour after pressing the button “Publish” or the second time today for the “Seven Broken Pieces”.

So I’ve published again during the night.

It does feel special and somehow very intimate. Just me and my book. I’d say this feels like celebrating a New Year’s Eve in an empty house or flat, alone with one’s sweetheart.

The two of us here, the rest of the world out there.

Or sleeping. Like the three sweetest people in my home right now. I’m smiling as I think about telling my family that I sent my third book for publication.

How we are going to celebrate. The digital launches are quiet, without clinking of glasses with Champaign, sharing chocolate and cake, and readings in a bookstore. But they are still very special. Particularly for the authors. So there is a wish to celebrate, to offer more surprises.

This is what I have planned already for quite some time and glad that I can finally tell you about it.

The e-book price for the “Seven Broken Pieces” will be (and remain most of the time) 0.99 $ at Amazon.com.

This was of course not the part of the celebration I meant.

Here it is: I have arranged that from February 10 to February 17 the price for “The Truth About Family” and “A Spy’s Daughter” will be set down to 0.99 $ each.

It means that in this time-frame you will be able to buy (currently) all of my three e-books (”The Truth About Family”, “A Spy’s Daughter”, and “Seven Broken Pieces”) for 2.97 $, which is less than the regular e-book price for “The Truth About Family” or “A Spy’s Daughter”, which is currently 2.99 $ each.

Right before this promotion starts, I will notify you again on this, so that you can purchase one or another of my e-books at a discounted price, if you didn’t purchase it (or them) yet, but would like to.

What I am up to now. The next project, which will see the light soon, is also a short story, which I will offer as a free e-book on my site. It is called “Between Grace and Abyss”. And of course there are few other projects in writing. But this news will come in another letter.

In the meanwhile, here is the e-book cover for my new short story

P.S. Great thanks to my brilliant cover designer, Alice Jago, for another wonderful creation for my books.

Optimist Wirter’s Business News: January 2016

January 26, 2016Optimist Writer's Business Newsvica

Similar to this month’s writing news, also the business site of my venture was very busy since mid December.

For the business part there are two projects, which I have been pursuing in December and now in January: Resources on generic Business Rules overview and S1000D Business Rules step-by-step guide.

The generic Business Rules resource has been completed and I will start preparing it soon for publication. This means that I will self-edit it (a couple of times), send it for reading to friends and colleagues, who also deal in their life with business rules and maybe also someone who doesn’t know about business rules but would like to.

A call-out here to you, who is new to business rules but you are whether also a business owner or responsible for a project or product in your organization and need an overview of a product life-cycle and also of business processes around it. Then you might be interested to beta-read my Business Rules book. Beta-reading means that you would read an early copy of it and provide comments for its improvements. What’s in it for you? You’ll learn a lot, of both what is there, but also by analyzing the content in the book you will gain practical skills on business rules definitions, since their definition is nothing else but analysis, structuring and content generation, all mixed up together. And there is a little something extra. I usually send a signed paperback copy of my book as a thank you gift to my beta-readers and all other who actively participate in shaping my books. So take a look at the resource here, and if its content appeals to you and you would like to participate in beta-reading of this book, then contact me at vib@optimistwriter.com.

Due to the generic Business Rules overview being finished now in its first draft, I will focus the generation of business content on the S1000D business rules step-by-step guide. Since the last newsletter it has been already reworked twice. One change was in respect to the numbering of the links with the specification for separate BRDPs. They are not sequential anymore but show which place in the chain the given BRDP occupies. And the second change is that I started structuring the S1000D Business Rules step-by-step guide in a similar way how I structured the generic Business Rules guide. This is also a great test for the second one in action.

A lot is happening right now in publishing, teaching and marketing parts of my business, so I will reduce the frequency of blog posting again to once a week for each category: one post on writing and one post on business topics.

Before I finish, I would like to mention another resource I am planning for the nearest future. It will be a short white paper or rather a short e-book on project dis-entanglement. More precisely, a collection of questions and tips, which by answering and applying will help you to find solutions for your stagnating projects. I will offer this resource for free download on my web-site. And as subscribers to this site you will be the ones of the very first to find out about this and to receive a copy of it.

I wish you success in your endeavours and look forward to further interact with you here, through the coaching services I offer, or other ways of collaboration and communication.

January 2016 News on writing from the Optimist Writer

January 25, 2016Books I write, Newsletters, Writingvica

Dear friends,

The time since the last newsletter (mid December) was one of the busiest I ever had in my professional life. And not only due to the holidays. Or rather less because of the holidays. They were as wonderful and recharging as always when we celebrate it with the family.

The busy side comes neither from external projects, since just like my family and me, most people took a break from work.

I did take a break from work (that is business side of my work), but I continued writing (and publishing), which helped me finish and start several projects in January.

You’ve heard already about the launch of “A Spy’s Daughter” a few days before Christmas. The freshest additional news here is that I have already received the edits on the prequel and my cover designer, Alice Jago, is working on the cover this week. So the prequel to the series “A Life Upside Down” called “Seven Broken Pieces” will see the light in February.

The free story “Nothing is As it Seems” is also well on the way and its end is near. I am very curious how exactly it will be.

I have also re-worked my very first short story and after that sent it to my editor. And I got the edits back this past weekend. This story was already published on my blog, but I have adjusted and edited it heavily. So it improved a lot and I will offer to download it free on my site soon.

My motivational resource for writers, “Cheerleading for Writers” is also taking shape. The three introductory and the first of the twenty-six alphabetically ordered posts are published and receive positive wave of likes and retweets on Twitter.com. If I write it in similar pace as now (one post a week or most every two weeks) I might finish it this year. I am very excited to see how it will develop.

Besides continuing writing my works-in-progress and preparing those finished for publication, I learn a lot about promotion and marketing. I am working with BooksGoSocial to promote my first book “The Truth About Family” on various social media. It is very exciting to see many tweets about my book and see how the whole community there is supporting each member. I became a member of their two groups on Facebook and started supporting other writers there and on Twitter as well. I still got to look into other Social media they advertise at. There is so much to learn and find out. I am very excited because this is truly a new world to me. Here is the link this service created for my book. Apart from the description you can also read the first page of the book there.

And then there are many extremely exciting things awaiting me in February. Writing and publishing are two of them. But I am also thrilled about my collaboration with the South Gate Society (SGS) School of Creative Writing here in Aalborg. On the one hand, I’ll be involved into their teaching process. Last year I have given an introductory course on Creative Nonfiction for their students and this year I’ll teach several courses on various topics. On the other hand, LeAnne Kline Chistiansen, the CEO and founder of the SGS, offered to organize an author evening for me, at which I will read from my books and share stories of my life as a writer. This is so extremely exciting! (How many times write I say exciting or excited in this post already? ;)) It will be the very first reading from my published books. I’ll report in the newsletter next month how it went.

In the meanwhile have a wonderful second month of the year 2016, enjoy reading, writing, your families, dear and loved ones, your work and any other passion you have in your lives!

Picture: A guest in our garden.

Business rules type, which ties it all up and lets you press the button “Execute”

January 21, 2016Business Rulesvica

I must admit that I procrastinated writing this article for almost two days. This post is the last one in the project.

There is something daunting about finishing a project. And finishing business rules definition is not different. It might appear even more daunting because the actual production and the service launch is about start. So you will have an end and a beginning at the same time.

By now you have planned your product or service by defining business rules from its scope, its design to the termination and eventual discarding.

There might have been a decision or two, and probably many more, which you could not define immediately and left to decide upon later. You might have forgotten about them. This can and does happen for all products and services. Since you simply can’t take everything in account at once, but also because some decisions need longer time to happen than the others. Some of these can be for example deciding and acquiring copyright or patents. I consider these as part of the business rules definition and not production, because they have to be in place before production.

The first and foremost what you have to do at this final stage of business rules definition, is jotting down and agreeing upon criteria when the “Execute” button can be pressed. You need to decide on the minimum must-have decisions in place, so that you can start the production process or roll-out your service.

The next step here is to see what decisions you already have taken from M to T in “Manipulate”, from Management to Termination.

Did you define the scope of your product?
Did you compare the customer requirements with what you initially had in your company, which could be utilized for your product or service?
Did you define the team inside and outside your company (including the representatives of the customer side)?
Do you know what needs to be acquired for the production/roll-out process to start? Did you already purchase a part of it? Can the rest be acquired after the pressing “Execute” button?
Did you plan the structure and access points to your product service?
Did you define the steps to be taken for the production start and service roll-out?
Did you plan the routine fabrication/creation and quality assurance, as well as trouble-shooting steps for your product service?
Did you clearly explain to all involved how the product/service must be used (customers, operators, maintainers, etc.)?
Did you clarify all the legal matters for your product or service? Does it and its production, use, and other processes follow corresponding laws and regulations? Did you get the necessary copyrights, patents, allowances and qualifications to start the process?
Did you legalize the business rules? My guess would be that at this stage this can not have happened yet, since you are reviewing them now. So the stamp needs to wait and will be put right before you press the “Execute” button.
Did you define all the necessary look and feel rules for your product? Do you know how exactly it will look like? Or are you still waiting for the corresponding definitions from your subcontractor. The best here would be to get some test samples or already some of the equipment for the service available and installed, so that you can test it.
Did you decide on the criteria dictating when to terminate/give up/replace your product or service? What do you have to communicate to the customer in this case? Do you have to let the customer know this already when you launch your product/service? The latter is quite a common practice with software and web-applications’ use agreements, which a customer has to consent to. They all have definitions of conditions for the regular and irregular contract termination.

How do all the above play together? Do you have to adjust one or another or all so that they fit? By now you have probably already made numerous adjustments at each of the steps as you went from one business rules type to another. But you need to review them again at the end of the business rules definition and you just did so.

So whenever you are ready press the button “Execute” or cut the ribbon and enjoy the ride.

And don’t forget to update the business rules along your production/service journey. Keep the checklists — which your business rules in fact are — up-to-date, then you will truly be able to enjoy and overview the process.

P.S. This was the final post for the Business Rules: General resource. The next steps for me here are self-edits and revision, beta-reading, professional edit and publication of the book. I will let you know as soon as the book is published. Your comments during this revision process will be highly appreciated since they will help me to improve the content in this book.

Cheerleading for Writers: A – Action

January 21, 2016Books I write, Cheerleading for writers, Writingvica

And action!

My mind plays many tricks on me with this one. It often starts acting and generating ideas long before or long after I am surrounded with at least some of the necessary equipment for the scene of creative writing to take place. For example many ideas come when I am taking a shower or just about to put my head on my pillow to sleep.

Then when I am in the process of writing, it often takes another turn and doesn’t follow the “brilliant” thoughts I had before. This disappoints my brain. I deliberately say it is my brain who is disappointed in that given moment and not me, because at some point of time when I look back at what I have written I do find some pieces, which are even better than the initial ideas.

Finally, when I’ve finished writing for the day, or morning or afternoon, thoughts appear, which are various versions of the following, “There’s no action, no fire in your writing!”

These thoughts appear in respect to work in progress, so I feel an urge to stress myself with improving and improving.

They also appear about already published work.

My first book “The Truth About Family” is very special to me. It is based on a true story of my father, and I find this story so exciting and gripping.

But then I react in my thoughts like a person who would want to diminish the merit of this work and think, “Somebody will think it’s boring.”

Now as I recall this, my answer to this thought is, “Of course there will be someone who won’t like the book and will find it boring. Probably because this person has different interests. But do I write for this person? No. I write for those who might be moved by this story, like it moved me.”

The interesting thing is that these negative thoughts do not appear when I open the book and read a passage and remember both my father and so many inspiring moments during the creation of the book. These thoughts appear when I complain about something completely different in the first place and don’t realize it. So any uplifting and constructive thought is dismissed with a annoyed hand-wave.

What helps is to let myself observe all my internal and external reactions, independent from whether I label them as good or bad. Then I am able to experience the fun of my writing process and the products of my writing.

I discovered that when I reread something from my published books, I can’t stop reading it before I finish a passage or a chapter. There is this novelty, this curiosity, “Did I write this?”

And the fun thing is to realize that every time I read a piece from before, I am a different person with at least slightly different views and inclinations. So I can always experience my books and articles anew and I can experience the world around me — which includes my creations — anew.

What helped me reach this point of more and more frequent moments of kindness to myself?

Two things. The first is practicing awareness and being fully present in the moment of now. A simple but brilliant approach of instantaneous transformation developed by Ariel and Shya Kane is a fair, kind and honest companion helping me realize that my thoughts are not me. They were acquired through my life as I have acquired and learned speaking as a child. And I continue acquiring them as I interact with the world around me. I might choose listening to them and then I might as well let them be. Depending on what these thoughts bring with them, a creative idea when I am there to create or a fearful one dreading the unknown.

The second great helper for me is the feedback from my friends and fans.

There must be something to it when you hear from your readers and friends say or write something like this about your writing:

“I read this book from beginning to end the day I received it. It was captivating! An easy to read book and one of the best books I have read all year.”

“This is a very well written story about finding your identity and yourself in the young years, and I was drawn into the author’s universe from page one. It is one of those books you don’t want to finish, because you have come to care for the persons and their stories.“

Both reviews above were written about “The Truth About Family”, the book, of which my brain feared being labelled as boring.

If you have doubts about your writing, observe yourself, the room around you, everything in the given moment of now, and then look closer.

Look closer and you will find scenes in your manuscript, which you wish not to end.

Action is in your nature. It keeps you alive. So there is also action in your writing. Just hold on to the feeling of excitement you know from when you read a captivating book. Observe yourself and you will find more and more often moments, when you experience the same while writing and later reading the pieces you wrote.

Picture: I caught the sweetest action there can be for a mother to witness. Her children playing. Or in this case rather hugging. My daughter Emma hugs by leaning hear head on the person she wants to hug. She attempted many of these head-hugs with Niklas yesterday. And sent him into multitude of giggles, because he is extremely ticklish.