Category Archives: The Writing Life

Posts about writing for fun and profit.

Keeping Up with Blogging

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I offer up an excuse for neglecting this blog.

It’s been a whole month since the last time I posted here. And I only posted twice in January. And not at all in December. Do you see a pattern here?

This blog will be 20 years old in October and has thousands of posts — probably millions of words — and I seem to be running out of steam.

Well, I am and I’m not.

My current priority is blogging about my Great Loop boat trip in Do It Now, which I’m about 135 days into. At this point, I’ve traveled over 2400 miles and have done about 2/3 of that solo — just me and my pups. I’m having a great time facing the challenges and reaping the rewards of the trip. I’ve got about 5 weeks left before I head home for the summer and my summer job. (Yes, I’m still drying cherries.) I’l be back at it in mid-September; I just hope I can catch up with the blog before then.

A brief word about my production rate

I’ve noticed that as I age — or maybe just as time goes on and the world/technology changes? — my writing production rate has slowed considerably. As I type this, it’s hard to see that — I’m really churning out the words this morning.

But writing those trip blog posts leads to distractions. I’m pretty sure its caused by the work I need to do to add photos and links. I have to stop writing to find, format, and add the photos. I have to stop writing to look up the name of a restaurant or tour company or marina and possibly find and add a link to it.

Any time my attention is taken away from my blog composition software, it wanders. While I’m getting a photo off my phone, I may notice an incoming text from a friend. That leads to catching up on texts and responding to them. Somehow I drift into email. Or while I’m looking up a restaurant name, I get pulled into social media, which is always open on a browser tab.

These are distractions I can fight if I’m aware of how they’re destroying my productivity. I’ve been better about fighting them lately, but still not good enough. Heck, even this little sidebar box is a distraction, taking me away from the main point of my blog post. Enough!

That priority is working me hard. I’m trying to write for at least 2 hours every morning, but these days 2 hours just isn’t enough to knock out a complete and illustrated blog post, with links to related content. As a result, I’m falling farther and farther behind. My last blog post on My Great Loop Adventure was published two days ago (March 16, 2023) and it covered the events of January 8, 2023. So yes, I’m more than two months behind.

What’s Sucking My Time

Understand that I’ve got other priorities, too. First, I need to move the boat from place to place. On a long travel day, or one where weather could be a factor later in the day, I might want to start early — possibly so early that I don’t get my two hours of writing in. I can’t write while I drive the boat and lately I’ve been driving the boat for 4 to 7 hours in a day.

Then there are the boat chores when I arrive. The biggest one is hosing down the boat, which I try to do on arrival any day I cruised on salt water. I’ve been cruising on the Gulf and Atlantic Intracoastal Waterways since December so that means pretty much any day I cruise. Hosing and brushing down the surfaces that got splashed enroute can take an hour. I usually follow that up with topping off my fresh water tank, since the hose is already set up.

There are inside boat chores, too. Washing dishes, doing laundry, vacuuming, taking out the trash, grocery shopping. Sounds like what you do at home, right? Well, this is my home, at least while I travel on the water. I did the same stuff when I took my camper south every year. There’s no escaping from it; there will always be chores to take care of a home.

I also need to do trip planning and make reservations as necessary. I don’t do this every day, but when I do it, it can easily take an hour out of my day.


Rosie and Lily on the steps leading up to the command bridge. They have become real boat dogs.

And then there are my pups, Lily and Rosie. They need to be fed twice a day and taken out for pee breaks at least three times a day. If I’m at anchor, that might mean a dinghy ride and all the extra chores related to that.


Charleston has some amazing architecture. The other day, I got a chance to explore it on foot.

In addition to all that, I need to have some fun. I want to explore the places I visit, usually by walking around, sometimes with my pups. Sometimes I take tours — like the Segway Tour I took in Savannah earlier this month. I love to go into shops and galleries and museums and just look at things. Occasionally I buy — yesterday I bought a new mat for outside the boat’s back door and a pair of shoes for art show work this summer. I eat out — usually lunch — to get a taste of the local food. (I can’t tell you how many oysters and versions of shrimp and grits I’ve tasted.) I also go on bike rides and do a bit of hiking.

And, of course, I need to wind down at day’s end and sleep. I normally sleep very well on the boat and can usually get at least 7 hours of solid rest.

So when you add up all the time I spend doing those other things, you can see that there’s not much time left to write — and most of that writing time is spent trying (in vain, apparently) to get my trip blog up to date.

This blog has fallen to the bottom of my priorities list.

Don’t Give Up Hope

I hope that the folks who normally read this blog have begun reading about my trip. Some posts are definitely more interesting than others. I think the photos really help tell the story. Of course, when I’m done with the trip — and my blog about it — the posts will be pulled offline and turned into a book. What you’re reading on that blog is the first draft.

I’ll try to get to this blog with non-boating posts again soon. But you probably shouldn’t expect much until this summer when I’ll have a lot more time on my hands.

I think.

On Ghostwriting

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There are only two reasons to do it.

Yes, I’m a helicopter pilot and jewelry artist now. But my second career, which has pretty much wound down at this point, was as a freelance writer. That career, which was in full swing when I started this blog in 2003 (not a typo) was successful enough for me to buy multiple investment properties, completely fund my retirement, take flying lessons, and buy a helicopter.

So yes, I think it’s fair to say that I know a bit about the business of writing.

The Crazy Ghostwriting Offer

So imagine my surprise when I see a tweet from a wannabe writer offering to “ghostwrite your sci fi, fantasy story, ebook, novel” for $5.

My first thought was what kind of desperate idiot would write someone else’s book for $5?

Let’s be clear here: writing may not be terribly difficult — it wasn’t for me — but it is time consuming. The fastest I ever churned out a book was a 280-pager in 10 days. It was my third or fourth book. Would I have taken $5 for 10 days of work? Hell no.

Would I have taken $5 for any piece of writing that had someone else’s name on it? Fuck no.

Ghostwriting Explained

Ghostwrite definition
Definition from Merriam-Webster: ghostwrite.

That’s what ghostwriting is all about: writing something for someone else and having that person’s (or another person’s) name on on it as the author. In most (or probably all) cases, copyright goes to the person or organization who hired the ghostwriter. This is a work for hire, which is relatively common in the publishing world.

Ghostwriters are commonly used by famous people with a story to tell — often biographical in nature — who lack the skill, time, and/or desire to sit down and write it. Remember, writing isn’t easy for everyone, there are lots of really crappy writers out there, and writing takes time, no matter how good or bad a writer is. Ghostwriter names don’t usually appear as author, although sometimes they’ll appear in smaller print after “as told to” or something like that.

There’s no glory in being a ghostwriter.

Dvorak's Inside Track
This is the first book I was involved in; I was a ghostwriter on 4 chapters and am mentioned in the acknowledgements.

I know this firsthand. My first book project was as a ghostwriter for John C Dvorak and Bernard J David on Dvorak’s Inside Track to the Mac back in 1991. Bernard hired me, after his agent suggested me, to write one chapter of the book. They liked what I turned in so much that they hired me for another three chapters. (You can read about this in a post titled “Freebies” on this site. I highly recommend reading this if you’re starting out as a writer and hope to make a living at it.)

Much later in my career, I ghostwrote a chapter or two for someone else’s book — was it the Macintosh Bible? I can’t even remember. In that case, I had expertise that the author lacked and the writing experience to get the job done right and on time.

Why Be a Ghostwriter?

Would I ghostwrite something today? Well, that depends. In my mind, there are only two reasons to ghostwrite a book:

  • Money. Plain and simple. That’s the only reason I did that second ghostwriting job. They paid me. And it wasn’t $5. (I honestly can’t remember what it was, but at that point in my career, it must have been at least $2,000.) Even that first ghostwriting gig, when I was a complete unproven unknown writer, paid me $500 per chapter — that’s $2,000 total.
  • Relationship building. This one is a little grayer. Suppose a publisher/editor contacted me about ghostwriting a book for a famous pilot. Suppose they were willing to pay (more than $5) but it wasn’t quite enough to get me to drop what I was doing and get to work. But suppose that this publisher/editor was building a book series by a bunch of pilots and the series was already popular. There was the definite possibility that ghostwriting this book could lead to more offers. And, if they liked my work enough, I’d be able to negotiate higher fees or other benefits — like an “as told to” byline on the cover — or even royalties on future work. If I thought this offer was a relationship builder that could lead to more or better opportunities in the future, I might go for it. It’s relationship building that I really got from those first four book chapters for Bernard. I co-authored my first book with him and that launched a solo writing career that spanned 85 books and hundreds of articles in just over 20 years.

At every writing opportunity, every writer should be asking one big question: what’s in it for me?

(Haven’t read my “Freebies” post yet? This is a perfect time to go do that.)

Why is this guy offering to write someone else’s book for $5? I can’t imagine — unless he just doesn’t have any ideas and wants someone to feed them to him?

Otherwise, why wouldn’t he just write his own damn book and self-publish it? Then at least his name would be on the cover and he’d own the copyright. He might even make more than $5.

Writers Write

I’ve been a writer since I was 13 years old and wrote stories and book chapters in spiral ring binders. Back then, I tried entering short story contests and failed miserably, not really knowing how to get started, and honestly, not being a very good writer. (I have those old notebooks to prove it; they make me cringe!) But I wrote anyway because I was a writer and the more I wrote — and read, don’t forget that! — the better I got.

(By the way, I write in this blog because I’m a writer. Real writers write. We can’t help it. I just don’t need to make a living as a writer anymore.)

Meanwhile, my family pounded the idea of having a stable career into my head. Writing was not a stable career — at least not in their minds. Being young and foolishly believing that they knew best, I made a wrong turn into a career in auditing and finance, losing 8 years that I could have spent building a writing career. By the time I became a freelance writer back in 1990, I had a home and financial responsibilities. I had to make a living as a writer. There was no going back.

Could I have made a living as a writer if I didn’t analyze every opportunity I found? Of course not. Instead, I’d be banging away at an office job, writing stories, likely never to be published, on evenings and weekends — as I did during my 8 year wrong turn.

The Take-Away

The takeaway is this: if you want to write, write. If you want to make a living as a writer, make sure you don’t sell yourself short. Take only the jobs that will move your career forward — or at least help pay the bills.

Self-Publishing a Paperback with Amazon KDP

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Easy enough, but not ideal.

Part 107 Explained
Want to become a commercial drone pilot? Start by learning all about the FAA’s Part 107. This book will help. Buy the ebook edition on Amazon or from Apple. Or buy the paperback edition on Amazon.

Back in April, I wrote and published a short guide to FAR Part 107, which are the regulations governing commercial small UAS (drone) pilot operations. In the U.S., a pilot who wants to fly a drone for hire must get some training on these rules and then prove they know them by taking a test. If you’re not already a pilot, there’s additional certification and training that must be done. The FAA has recognized that a small UAS is an aircraft and must be regulated as such. As a helicopter pilot sharing airspace with drone pilots, I’m pretty happy about that, although I’m not happy about the folks who operate with little or no regard for the rules.

In preparing for the test and later answering people’s questions about the regulations, I looked for a guide that explained everything in plain English. When I couldn’t find one, I wrote one. It was my first book project in about four years and it wasn’t very tough for me. When it came time to publish it, I did it the easy way: I created ebook files in the correct formats and published them in the Apple bookstore and on Amazon.com.

Understand that I’m a big proponent of ebooks and very rarely buy printed books anymore. It’s a lot more convenient for me to read on my iPad and I get the added benefit of taking as many books as I want with me on trips without adding any weight to my luggage. I assumed that the folks who wanted a book like this would be on the same page as me.

But apparently that isn’t so. Lots of people seem to really like printed books, even for something as short as this one.

I normally use a print on demand publisher for my paperback book publishing needs: Lightning Source. They are affiliated with Ingram, so any book I publish using their service is automatically listed in Books in Print and appears in bookstore book catalogs, including Amazon and Barnes and Noble. The service isn’t difficult to use if you have the ability to create a PDF in the correct format. I usually write my books in InDesign, which can spit out documents in the formats I need. I fill out a few online forms, I upload the content and cover files, I pay a nominal fee, and I wait. The books are usually available within a week or so.

But yesterday, while checking the sales for the Part 107 book on Amazon, I saw a link for creating a paperback using Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). I did some research on how it worked, what it cost, and how royalties were calculated. It seemed straightforward enough so I thought I’d give it a try. I figured that if I didn’t like the results, I could cancel publication and get the paperback printed through Lightning Source.

I spent about five hours yesterday prepping the manuscript for print publication. The trouble was, the manuscript I’d published as an ebook was absolutely filled with links to references on the web and cross-references to book content. In the ebook, you could tap a link to go right to that source — another benefit of ebooks over printed books. I had to manually convert all of the references to URLs in footnotes or page references in parentheses. I also had to remove all of the URL formatting that had been applied to link text. And because many of the URLs were really long, I had to use a URL shortener — I prefer bit.ly — to give each link a short, custom URL.

When I was done, I tried creating a PDF but didn’t like the results. I was working with Microsoft Word 2011 — I never did go to the Office 365 suite — and it doesn’t offer many options for PDF files. And, for some reason, it was spitting out a separate PDF for each section of the document. (I used sections to add custom headers for each chapter of the book.)

Since the KDP system accepted Word documents, I uploaded in that format. I then spent another half hour recreating the book cover for print.

When I was all finished, I previewed the book. That’s when I discovered that KDP had changed pagination for some reason that wasn’t immediately apparent, thus making my table of contents incorrect. Great.

I was offered the option of downloading a “corrected” Word document, so I did. When I opened it up, I discovered that the “correction” included changing the margins for the document. I knew what they said the margins should be, but I thought that was a suggestion. Apparently, it was a requirement. So I opened my “uncorrected” file, changed the margins, updated the table of contents and cross-references page numbers, and made a few other minor tweaks. Then I saved the file, uploaded it again, and previewed the results. It was fine.

Ready for Publishing
Here’s the dialog that appeared when I clicked Publish.

I clicked the buttons that needed clicking and eventually saw a dialog box telling me that my paperback had been submitted. Although one message had told me it could take 72 hours, this one said 12 hours. Whoa.

I shut down my computer for the day and went about my business. It was only 3 PM. I think I spent a total of 6 or 7 hours on the conversion process.

This morning, a little black dog who will remain nameless in this discussion decided she needed to bark at the coyotes howling off in the distance at 3:15 AM. That was all I needed to wake me up.

I lay in bed for a while with my iPad, checking weather, doing a word puzzle I do every morning, and checking in on Twitter. Then I decided to check Amazon to see if my paperback book appeared. I was very surprised to see that it did.

Book Listing
Here’s my book, all ready for purchase. I think it might be #1 in New Release and #11 in in Books > Arts & Photography > Photography & Video > Aerial because I bought two copies this morning.

Of course, I bought two copies right away: one for me and one for my friend Jim, who got me into drones. The only way I’m going to see the book is by buying it. At least I earn royalties on the purchase.

I guess what blows me away is just how quickly the book was made available. When they said 12 hours, they weren’t kidding. I used standard Prime shipping; my book will arrive Monday because today is a holiday and they don’t deliver on weekends. Still, that means they’ll print and ship the book tomorrow.

If the book looks as good as the ones I get through Lightning Source, I might have a new provider for my limited audience paperbacks. Let’s face it: Amazon sells more books than anyone else. For a book that normally would not appear in a brick and mortar bookstore, there isn’t much of a reason to get it in that Ingram catalog. And although I need to run the numbers, I suspect I might actually make more money publishing through Amazon; I’ll have to do a cost analysis to see.

As for ease of publishing, well, if you don’t try to get fancy and you use the Word template Amazon provides, it’s pretty darn easy to publish a book. So easy that I’m thinking of doing it again this month. The only thing I miss is the flexibility of getting my manuscript just the way I like it. Maybe it’s time to fire up InDesign and use that to create PDFs that KDP can’t change.