Gary Richardson Author Blog

The Storytelling Formula

Recently, I started thinking about what makes a good story. I know how I like to tell stories but given that I have no formal training or education when it...
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How Important Are Word Counts?

I don't know about anyone else, but when I write I don't write to a target word count. I write to tell a story regardless of how few or how...
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My Top Reads: Animal Farm

Continuing on my journey of discussing some of my all-time favorite books to read, the latest is a classic. Animal Farm by George Orwell was first published in 1945. I don't know when it was first considered a masterpiece or became thought of as a classic book but I know in when I was in school it had already been deemed both. Of course, in recent years it saw some level of controversy, though I can't say that I followed along with it enough to know why or what the result was. I just know it was in the news for a bit a few years back, but then again, most classics usually touch on premises or social constructs that are frowned upon these days so it stands to reason that there were elements that were considered acceptable at the time of the book's publishing that some probably disagree with today and have expressed their opinion on the matter in the media.
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The power of good editing software/skills

I recently finished my first draft of a science fiction manuscript. Once I had all of my work in a single document for the first time (I write in One Note with each chapter as its own "Page" and then compile the finished work into a Word document), I was able to see the full detail of my work. At first glance, this was my longest manuscript to date registering roughly 108,000 words, just a little more than the average word count of 80,000-90,000 words.

But as I started to apply my editing tools, I quickly started seeing that number shrink. Redundant words, unnecessary adjectives, and useless phrases like "in fact" and "In an effort to" were removed or changed to something more appropriate. By the time I had finished using the basic editing tool in Word and the Grammarly plug-in I had reduced the over all word count of my manuscript by about 1,000 words.

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My Top Reads: The Drizzt Series

Okay, so a series may not be something you might expected as a top read but this is an excellent series by R.A. Salvatore. It is high fantasy with elves, dwarves, and the like so fans of that genre should definitely check out this series.

The series has been running for several years and follows the adventures of a drow (dark elf) named Drizzt Do'urden. Every book in the series is good but there is definitely an order in which they have to be read though the titles do little to help you get it straight. When in doubt, just Google it.

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Newman Springs Publishing

I just want to take a minute to give a quick shout out to Newman Spring Publishing. I know that I've mentioned them in other blogs and even written at some length about my journey getting my first book, The Ascension Legacy - Book 1: The Shame Ranger, published using their services but I think it is important to promote and encourage those who have promoted and encouraged me.
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Negative Reviews

Putting something you've created out there for the public is always a terrifying experience. You never know what others will think about something that' you've put hours, days, months, or even years of time into. And that's amplified even more in today's world of total connectivity where something can go viral around the world in mere minutes. A negative review can go from just local to worldwide at the click of a button where the vultures of the Internet can just pile on at will.

Someone once said that to be an author you had to first develop thick skin.

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When do you write?

When I tell people that I like to write stories that will hopefully one day be books, those who know my life often ask when do I have time to...
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