Second Edition Hell City Hills

Fourth of July Special! $0.99 for The Boy With Whe Koi Tattoo!

Hey guys! Changed the pricing on my second novel in my Boys in love series. The Boy With The Koi Tattoo is now just $0.99!! :D This is a permanent change in the price. Happy Independence Day everyone!

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok

Comipo comic secret Lovers all done

Although I'm not too happy with the Comipo program I still managed to make a complete flash comic story from it. It's called "Secret Lovers" and its about two friends who fall for the same guy. I tried to keep it as short as possible because I started it to play around with the capabilities of the program. I wish there was more I could do with the program but at least I now have a better idea as to what type of mangas I can make with it.

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok

Editing, artists, and the virtues of a thick skin

Hi! I posted this to someone who asked me for some advice on publishing. I figured the advice was pretty good so I decided to publish it here. This is me on using create space editing, hiring the artist for my covers and artwork, and the virtue of a thick skin.

I began by sending some of my horror shorts to websites that published them and writing screenplays but how I managed to publish my first book was by using a site called Create space and also Amazon's Kindle service.
https://www.createspace.com/
https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/signin

I didn't use an editor for the first few books. I tried to arrange one for "The boy with the Koi tattoo" but it fell through before I was to publish it. Now I have an editor for "Lyrical Disgrace" and I used the create space optional publishing service for it. It gets a little expensive but I hope the editors can catch the things I keep missing. The main advice I can give is to keep writing, write anything and everything and it may suck but edit edit edit....I edited my first book like crazy and yet there are still mistakes that make me cringe. If you can afford it an editor is always nice because sometimes it gets really hard to spot mistakes after staring at your words for a while.

A good cover will draw people in and at least get people to read your first chapter or blurb. I hired Candra to do my covers and insert artwork and I will commission for Lyrical soon as well. I did hire some other artists but one got lazy on me and quit and another didn't draw the characters the way I liked. So make sure you get any artist to draw a rough sketch before shelling out a ton of money. It took a lot of hard work and disappointments before finding Candra. But I'm glad I put in the work cause I think the artwork is amazing and Candra is so professional.

http://candra.deviantart.com/journal/Commissions-Info-242470662

The only other piece of advice I have is to have a thick skin once you submit it for publishing. Cause no matter how hard you worked there will be people telling you how awful you are, pointing out every mistake you've made, recommending everyone to stay away from your books, and so on....but you will have people who love your work as well. It's not to say that the one star reviews are wrong or unfair, sometimes you have to look into why you got them but you should never let other people decide what you do with your life! Just be the best you can be and it will all eventually fall into place.

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok

Yaoi and Gay fiction: What’s the difference?

Maybe I’m beating a dead horse…or maybe not. I haven’t read many things online about the differences between the two and many people view them as one in the same. However, as subtle as the line is drawn between the two terms I still believe that there are major differences between them that can actually turn readers away.

For example; If a gay male purchases a yaoi novel expecting to read gay fiction he may be sorely disappointed in what he encounters. Gay fiction are novels typically written by men for men…and women for men, or women for women that focus primarily on everyday gay issues regardless of the time period, or they may be typical romance stories that just so happen to feature a gay relationship. Homoeroticism is the naughtier version of gay fiction. I’m going to be honest and admit that I am far from an expert on the subject of gay fiction…I know I’m strange, but at the end of the day I am a woman and a straight one at that and I can’t pretend that I understand gay men and what they want to read. I watched Queer as Folk…I liked it…until around the final season. But still, I can’t say I know what gay men would want to read or what turns them on. I don’t know if I’m veering totally off track right now but bear with me. lol!

There are just certain things that I notice among gay men that I as a woman do not find the least bit appealing. Such as gay porn. All the grunting, hairy fat assholes, bear men, leather chaps, spitting globs of spit into assholes…I think I should stop before I reveal just how much gay porn I’ve watched. Quite Honestly, I find gay porn just as lame as straight porn and perhaps the reason is because like straight porn, gay porn is aimed at men who are highly visual and aggressive creatures whereas women are more sensual. I can’t speak for all, but I find that men as a whole love nasty raw sex while women crave the beauty of sex. I’m not saying women are not visual or nasty, we most certainly are. But men prefer the more “in your face” Hard light colors while we like a soft light and diffused look…if that makes any sense.

Which brings me back to the differences between yaoi and gay fiction. If gay fiction is Hard light then Yaoi is most likely soft light. Yaoi are novels or manga typically written by women for women…or women for men that focus primarily on gay relationships regardless of the time period, or they may be typical romance stories that just so happen to feature a gay relationship. Sounds the same as gay fiction. However, I changed my wording a bit there. Yaoi is actually the naughtier version of boy’s love…so maybe I should have titled this yaoi and Homoeroticism or Boys’ Love and Gay fiction…whatever. Anyway, there are many lovers of gay fiction who are turned off by Yaoi and would never read it because it quite simply doesn’t appeal to them and some are even angry and hateful toward the genre for its depiction of unrealistic stories and events.

Expecting yaoi to be like gay fiction is like expecting straight men to write realistic lesbian fiction. It’s just not going to happen. As a matter of fact I would go as far as to say that Yaoi is more hyperrealistic than gay fiction. It’s gay fiction amplified by as many times as the author writing it. Gay men have tops and bottoms and in betweens while yaoi has Semes and Ukes, the Semes are mega men, aggressive and taking what they want while the Ukes in the most extreme cases are more of a girl than any real girl. Yaoi is not a literal interpretation of the gay lifestyle but an over exaggeration of it.

Mind you it’s not to say that yaoi can’t depict real gay relationships. They most certainly can but there is only so much knowledge a straight woman can have on the subject of real gay relationships. And like I said before, the degrees of exaggeration depends on the author. Some like super girly Ukes and others prefer manly Ukes or a Uke that resides somewhere in the middle. I know I love manly and middle ground Ukes. Some authors (ok a lot) prefer a super sweet sappy romances while others write more angst , grittiness and so forth. Either way, I’m glad both genres exist as they both have something to offer to both men and women alike.

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok

You dashed my hopes Dorrance Publishing

So today I got a letter in the mail from a publishing company claiming that when I copyrighted my novels, info was forwarded to them and they were interested in my books. At first I was very excited. I mean what author can say a publishing company sought them out? But then I began to notice that they never mentioned the name of any of my novels. They simply ask me to send my manuscript to them and they will review it for free.

Hm, Now the wheels are turning...It seemed like a scam. So I searched online and lo and behold I find other authors warning others against Dorrance Publishing. Geez! And here I was all excited thinking my work was recognized. That's how they get ya! Yeah just send in some formal looking letter, mention how they found you (Which is probably a lie as they most likely just troll author's copyright claims), and offer to review your stuff for free. Since they are a vanity publisher they would probably not even review my novels just throw it in the garbage then send another formal letter telling me they loved it and now I have to pay $10,000 to do what I can do better for WAY less on amazon.com and createspace.

No thanks Dorrance Publishing I already have several grand in student loans I have to pay off. I don't need you siphoning money out of my pocket with your crap vanity press.

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok

FREE Saturday!!!

The Boy with the Koi Tattoo will be available on Kindle all day tomorrow!! So make sure you take full advantage!! :D

LINK

Come visit my site for news, character information, free shorts and more! Rochelle Ragnarok