Jade Varden Official Blog

Spend time on a computer regularly, and it's bound to happen to you: data loss. Power outages, viruses, various meltdowns, there are all sorts of reasons your computer might malfunction and cause you to lose something you'd rather keep. But when it happens to your manuscript, it's the deepest cut of all. Don't lose your work! There are ways to avoid the problem, and ways to fix it when you haven't been avoiding it arduously enough.   Saving Your Book I'm a little on the obsessive side when it comes to saving my work, because I've agonized through more than one crash in the past. But I've learned others aren't quite so psychotic about hitting the "save" button repeatedly. In fact, the computer makes it pretty easy to get lazy. Any word processing program worth its hard drive space will have an auto-save feature that automatically saves your progress, pretty much every time you pause. Even online programs, like blogger and gmail, ...

Dawn Smith Books , a blog dedicated to writers and writing, has kindly named me as their official blog tour stop for the week! Visit the site to get all the details on the first two books in the Deck of Lies Series, Justice and The Tower. You'll find the blurbs, the reviews, the trailers and more.

The English language doesn't always make a whole lot of sense. The word "subtle" has an inexplicable b in the middle of it, "knife" is spelled with a k ...and a single letter can totally change the meaning of a word. So when you're writing, are you getting farther along in your book -- or are you getting further along in your work? Maybe you're doing both, and either way you'd better know the difference. Farther vs. Further It's an epic word battle, and one I personally struggle with every single time. No matter what I'm writing, the minute I want to use further or farther , I'm forced to stop what I'm doing and look up the differences between them. It's just one little vowel, but it makes a big difference if you end up using the wrong one. In fact, it changes what you're writing entirely.

In the indie community, writing reviews isn't a courtesy -- it's pretty much expected. Indies know how hard it is for other indies to get reviews (or readers at all), and there are lots of different groups, review swaps and deals happening all over the indie book community at any given time. Because of the helpful spirit, the tit-for-tat review deals and the strong desire among indies to get more and more reviews, writing reviews is something a great many indie writers have to face. So if you're going to do it, make sure you know what the hell you're doing. How much do you know about writing reviews?  Reading, Writing Many writers are also readers, because to practice the craft you've got to love it. Reading someone else's work is the only thing that keeps me sane at times...and other times, it's enough to drive me insane. That's because reading within the indie community isn't the same as dipping into the mainstream fiction pool. There a...

Yes, the rumors are true: I've finished the first draft of Death, Book 3 in the Deck of Lies series. I still have some serious editing to do, but a few very brief passages are suitable for public viewing and I'm going to share one of them! (image from the official trailer, yet to be released) Excerpt from Chapter ?     I was striding across the grass with a smile frozen onto my lips. I was wearing a bit less eye makeup, and my mascara had been re-applied with a shaking hand, but no one looked at me oddly as I moved toward the milling party guests -- so I guess I did a good enough job of repairing my appearance.     Things were in full swing, now. All of the Japanese lanterns were lit, their colorful shades creating a haze of light that made it difficult to see the stars above. Voices were louder now that the beautifully-garbed people had been here long enough to enjoy more than one of the complimentary drinks that were being doled out by the tr...

If you've read any books in the Deck of Lies series, you've probably noticed that I'm into fashion. I label-drop constantly, and I've tried to create a distinct style for Rain and many of her supporting characters (I've even blogged about those styles). But I don't get to write about fashion in my books as much as I'd like, so I've started writing for VAR magazine to get my fashion fix.  I write about vintage fashions and current vintage trends in Issue 1 of VAR , which was just released this month. VAR is packed with fashion-centric photos and articles. It's based in New York, and even though I'm not I'll be contributing articles on a freelance basis to the magazine from time to time (when I'm not writing about murder plots and family intrigue). You have to buy the issue to see it all, but various snippets and articles will be available on the VAR site soon. Issue 1 features Alysha Nett, Bai Ling, Bernadette Macias, Dave Navarro...

You were careful to choose great words for your book. You sweated it out through the editing process. You went through the formatting line by line to make certain every page is perfect. If you don't price your books the right way, you're going to watch that hard work go to waste. If you want readers, you've got to take a hard look at your book pricing. How Much is Your Writing Worth? A lot of factors are at play when writers are pricing their books. For any given book, whether it's a short story of a full-length novel, every page represents hours of work in formatting, writing, editing and reading. If authors charged by the hour, every book would cost hundred of dollars. But that's not really feasible for the readers, is it? As a writer, you're expected to love your book. You've poured soul into it; sweat, blood, tears, heartache. And, if you're like many writers, you probably want to do nothing but write full-time. It's easy to get lo...

 How many times does the word very appear in your book? You really ought to find out, because really, the word is very, very unnecessary. In fact, some writers have made it a point never to use the word at all. Very in Literature "Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very'; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be." This was Mark Twain's opinion of very...and most anyone will agree that Twain was, and remains, a very successful writer. Very hasn't got much of a place in literature because it is a very empty word.  Most of the time, the word very has very little meaning when it's used in writing. It's a word that exists almost solely for emphasis alone, except for when it's used in a very specific circumstance. Very can also denote something precise or exact ( those were her very words ), but most of the time it's used as a word of emphasis rather than as a synonym for...