Postcards from Dwightland

-


Note:  I will periodically post updates from my website:  dwightland.homestead.com  It's a high-traffic website.  Last week, I got 122 visitors.

what's up in dwightland?  
* Recently, I ran my first paid national advertising for my novel Prospect of My Arrival.  It ran Feb 3-5 on the popular site Kindle Nation Daily. Click to see the ad, a link to the evocative book trailer, news of Hollywood's interest in my self-published novels and more.  Sold about 45 kindle books + 5 people borrowed from kindle library.

* Hollywood has been knocking at my door to ask about movie rights to PROSPECT and THE HOPE STORE. Both Disney and Johnny Depp's production company are considering...


* I just entered Hope Store into ABNA, the Amazon novel contest. On Feb. 23, they announce the 2,000 books out of 10,000 that are advancing based on our 300-word pitches.


* Will soon start work on my third novel. Also hope to be writing a non-fiction book for novelists. "READER VELOCITY: Understanding the Speed of Your Novel from a Reader's POV." 
What can an author do to ensure that pages turn, that the reader feels the story is moving with proper velocity and not dragging?  Many novelist books look at the act of writing from the author's POV. But I want to look closer at the reader's experience of a book. How do we raise/satisfy/or frustrate reading expectations?




UPCOMING CREATIVE PROJECTS FOR 2012:


JUDY TOBEY – Needs some product video for her 
     flower essences for pets behavior OptiBalancePet.
ANNE WRIGHT MCGRAVIE – Needs website/blog 
     for arts tours in australia...AVEC PLEASURE.
CHICAGO ANNE M -- Needs me to add an external blog to her website.  Will make it much less work for her on a monthly basis.  Won't have to update content on homepage. Can link to her site. 


RUSS KUZUHARA – Needs website as singer/songwriter.
LISA WHARTON – Needs book trailer for 
     Last Kiss in Tiananmen Square.

Comments

  1. Dwight OkitaFebruary 14, 2012 at 7:39 PM

    Drop a coin into a well...

    A voice might come back to you!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Comments are always appreciated! Thank you.

Popular posts from this blog

My entry to the 2013 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards

-
Image
It's Monday, Jan 28. I am part of a large blogging event called the "Re-Introduce Myself" Blogfest where I get to introduce myself to new audiences. My name is Dwight Okita. I live in Chicago where I design websites and work at a nonprofit for the visually impaired. I just finished writing my second novel THE HOPE STORE and I've entered it in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest. You can learn more about the contest at www.amazon.com/abna Below is the pitch for my book: "We don't just instill hope. We install it."  That's the slogan for the first store in the world to sell hope over the counter.   Luke Nagano goes to sleep each night dreaming about hope and how to make more of it, ever since he lost his sister. He and his partner prepare the store for its grand opening. As media interest grows, an activist group called the Natural Hopers emerges with the mission to warn the public about the dangers of synthetically created
Read more

MOVIE REVIEW OF ANOMALISA: An Edward Hopper Painting Come to Life

-
Image
Charlie Kaufman's film ANOMALISA is the movie that moved and thrilled me the most this year. It's not for everyone, but it was for me. Kaufman gives us trippy, amazing movies like ETERNAL SUNSHINE, and BEING JOHN MALKOVICH. And this movie is just as trippy and amazing but not in his usual way. Eternal Sunshine threw us into sci-fi territory with a machine that could erase painful memories, and the visuals were a beautiful nightmare. Malkovich gave us John M in a red dress on a p iano, John M in a hallucination of multiple Malkoviches. But ANOMALISA felt different to me. What was trippy was the presentation (stop motion puppets) but for a change the content was surprisingly naturalistic and realistic (middle aged man has identity crisis en route to giving a motivational speech). But it's in the lovely, cryptic dialog, the surrealism appears. Kind of like in a Haruki Murakami novel where simple reality starts taking tiny, menacing, magical U-turns.  It also rem
Read more

How Big Is The Circle of Your Friends?

-
Image
Do you ever think about the circles of your friends? How the circles shrink and grow and morph over time? I do.  How consciously do you work to expand your those ever-important circles? So I was talking to a Luther, a male friend, about how I find myself in mid-life with mostly female friends.  I'm a gay man. Nothing wrong with any of that. They're great friends. And many of my female friends are single women in the arts -- so we have things in common.   But I used to have a larger collection of male friends. Many of them were gay. What happened?  Well, the AIDS crisis took some of those who should rightfully be living beside me today. So there's that. Some others found life partners. And of course any friendship can end with time. Someone moves away. Someone stops keeping the ball rolling on their end. Arguments happen that can't be resolved. And that special chemistry between friends can one day disappear for no reason. You are no longer necessary to each
Read more