Updates and stuff

So having played with the shiny new toy, I've now updated the RikVerse website to include links and stuff on each of the chapbook pages. I also took the opportunity to spruce up the Rikweb Bookshop (on lulu.com) - just in case someone stumbles across the thing and in a mad fit of generosity decides to purchase the book.

I'm thinking that one further addition to the Rikweb website, on the Kalieda side of things most probably, should be the addition of a bulletin board (phpBB3). Not that I want to start my own community or cult or anything, but I think having something like a BB will be useful place to store background stuff - stuff like map tutorials or biology ideas which I find myself posting to other BBs which then get pruned.

I'm also thinking of maybe setting up a forum as a guestbook for the website - I always liked having a guestbook (and coded the old one up myself), but had to decommission it in the end because of the amount of spam it was attracting. Maybe the inbuilt spam controls on the current phpBB thingy could come in useful ...

What else am I doing? Well, I've failed this year's NaNoWriMo in spectacular fashion (unlike young Scavella and the other TUF stalwarts, who get a line of Conga Rats from me on their achievements).

Instead, I've been re-reading and annotating my first novel (now rejected by three Agents) with a view to a major redraft in January and sending out to more agents in the early spring. Believe me, this book is good - maybe a touch more spit'n'polish will help convince others of its goodness next year.

On the Rik's Blog Story (RBS) front, I'm not giving up on it yet! I might not have written much of it this NaNo, but I've certainly been thinking about it and have a good idea about where I want it to go. And I've also decided that I'm not going to go down the agented route with this one; rather, I'm just going to publish it via lulu.com - if only to keep the RikVerse book company in the otherwise bare shelves of the Rikweb Bookshop.

I might also carry on writing it on the Rikweb BB rather than here - one of the major drawbacks of writing anything long on a blog is the insistence of the software that posts appear in date-descending order, which I think is a real turn-off for both of my casual browsers.

As for this year, I'm planning to pull my finger out of my creative arse and do some work on both the RBS and on the Long Poem. I want the LP to be published (again via lulu.com) by spring next year - why wait to new year's eve to make resolutions, huh?

And I've just noticed that lulu.com appear to have extended their Publsihed By You service to the UK - which means that Rik's Sparky Little Printing Press may in fact become a reality rather than just a line on the frontpage of the RikVerse book and chapbooks.

I can't believe I haven't posted any cat photos on the blog this year - have to do something about that this week ...