• Challenge,  News

    Study Along and Updates

    Just Finished Last Stories… And I posted a video on the study along talking about the 3rd assignments. I know the class technically ended Thursday, but took me that long to finish reading the few stories. Also I will get back to slowly reading from the classes I am behind on. With the level of the eye at this point, I can only do a few a day, but that is a ton better than a month ago. So I will make my way through them all. Honest. (grin) Also trying to ramp up on the distance in exercise. Running much at all has been tough because of the eye…

  • Challenge,  Misc,  News

    Email Issues

    GMail is My Account… If anyone is expecting me to respond to an email sent to the dean@deanwesleysmith.com address, send it to my gmail email address, which I have been using now for years. The .com email, with the move to this site’s new home, seems to have finally given up the ghost. And it was bad and spotty before. I will try to return it next week to a functioning status, but please don’t use it. Thanks!!

  • Challenge,  Misc,  News

    Sitting and Laughing….

    Just Couldn’t Stop Laughing… I got sent this newsletter that I tend to read every month. It is from a major traditional published person, a former editor and so on, who has her head so far up the ass of traditional publishing, I have no idea how she sees anything clearly. And she often does not. She pretends to pay attention to indie publishing, then does a sad and so uninformed piece of Pay-to-Publish, I got disgusted. But that is not what made me sit and just laugh and have a hard time stopping this afternoon. She did an article about how the AALA (American Association of Literary Agents) revised…

  • Challenge,  News

    Dave Farland (Wolverton) Has Left Us

    Yes, Tonight It Is Sadly Official… Dave was kept alive for the day until all his children could get there and say goodbye, then he moved on. Damn it all to hell. Way, way too young. Dave and Kris and I were friends for 37 years. We did so much together over the years, it is impossible to remember it all. Over the last few years, Dave and I had some fantastic conversations about writing and our different approaches to teaching. It was great fun for both of us, great discussions, considering that back in the day, we were in writing learning groups together and learning from each other all…

  • Challenge,  Misc,  News

    Walking Again And Not Attending 20Books..

    Got Two 5K Runs This Saturday… One run in the morning, one run in the evening. I am a long ways from being in good enough shape and down enough weight to actually run both of them. But both are great charities and worth the support, so we are going to try it. I will do a bunch of walking. One is a Donny Osmond run, meaning he uses his name to support the charity. I actually talked with him a couple years back about a book I started to write for him that fell through thirty years ago. He didn’t remember and I would have been shocked if he…

  • Challenge,  Fun Stuff,  News

    Cattitude Story Bundle

    Great Fun!!! A Cat Storybundle… And wow does it have cats in it. Lots and lots of cats. Get it at https://storybundle.com/cats Kris curated this one and it is named after a Pulphouse book Cattitude that I edited. I’ll let Kris describe the bundle here. Don’t miss this one!! ——— The 2021 Cattitude Bundle – Curated by Kristine Kathryn Rusch This bundle thrills me. Often, I curate StoryBundles filled with books I’ve read. Always, I curate with authors whose work I like. But as I curate them, I’m aware that I am a moody reader who rarely wants to read what’s prescribed. So, with the books I have only read…

  • Challenge,  News,  On Writing

    A LOT OF LEARNING…

    Right Now Only in The Fey Kickstarter Campaign… That’s right, The Return of the Fey Kickstarter Campaign has already reached its fourth stretch goal, and three of those goals have a brand new Pop-Up writing class in it that every backer will get. So here are the three new Pop-Up classes that I will be posting as I get them recorded over the next few weeks. And if you are a backer of the campaign, you will get a code to get them for free. You can also buy them on Teachable for $150 at any point after I record and post them. Kris and I built these. Actually more…

  • Challenge,  News

    Got Both Shots!!

    Exhausted… But not sure if that is a reaction to the second shot, or relief that I have them both, or because I had to stand in a line that was almost one mile long (not kidding) in the sun on concrete for 3.5 hours. Not kidding. And there was a line that long for each of the two brands of vaccines. Thousands and thousands of people, all getting second shots at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Luckily I got there over an hour early and managed to get in the correct line, so I got my shot only two hours late from my appointment. So happy and tired. In…

  • Challenge,  Kickstarter Campaign,  News

    Finished Cave Creek Novel

    Card Sharp Silver: A Cave Creek Novel This book got sidetracked badly because of Covid this last year. I just sort of put it away for the longest time, then finally brought it back out in November after the election and started dinging at it again, planning to have it done right about now. It’s a short novel at 31,000 words, and now Kris will read it and then it will go to WMG for copyediting, then it will be posted to the Shared World Class. By the way, if you have opted out of emails on Teachable, you are missing a lot of instructions and updates. Emails are how…

  • Challenge,  News,  Recommended Reading

    Last Days of a Great Storybundle!!

    I Have a New Collection In This Bundle Just over one day left to get this bundle. This collection premiered in this nifty Space Opera Storybundle curated by Robert Jeschonek. A Billion Earths: A Seeders Universe Collection of five major stories in my Seeders Universe. And the Storybundle it is in is flat out amazing.  You don’t want to miss those books if you are a fan of space opera. You also get the book that started Kris’s incredible Retrieval Artist series. So don’t miss this. Just a day to go and the bundle will be gone. My collection is not published out wide yet, and won’t be for another…