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Kristine Kathryn Rusch » free nonfiction

The Business Rusch: The “Brutal” 2000-Word Day

The Business Rusch: The “Brutal” 2000-Word Day Kristine Kathryn Rusch I know, I know. I didn’t do a long blog last week because of the hack-attack, now fixed, and I heard from a lot of you wondering what the “missing” post would have been about. Many of you speculated that I would take on Simon Lipskar’s ridiculous letter from the Association of Authors Representatives to the Department of Justice.  My husband Dean Wesley Smith, Joe Konrath, The Passive Guy, Bob Mayer, and others did a fine job with that. [links] In my opinion, David Gaughran did the best post of all: he wrote an open letter to the DOJ, which all writers should read and should probably sign onto. I have. The thing is, I wouldn’t have written about the AAR letter. What … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: A Short Post

The Business Rusch: A Short Post Kristine Kathryn Rusch   As most of you know, my website got hacked last week. In fact, all of my websites–and I have a few–got hacked. So I’ve been busy, even though I don’t have a lot to show for it. Dean and I hired a website security firm to clean up the mess, and to clean up our other sites. The firm will also monitor the website every four hours to make sure it doesn’t get hacked again. We have hired a second security firm to do the same thing, figuring redundancy is our best option. As of this writing, the warnings are still up that this is a dangerous website. The security firm assures me that the websites are safe. Ye Olde Website Guru has also … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: Royalty Statement Update 2012

The Business Rusch: Royalty Statement Update 2012 Kristine Kathryn Rusch   Over a year ago, I wrote a blog post about the fact that my e-book royalties from a couple of my traditional publishers looked wrong. Significantly wrong. After I posted that blog, dozens of writers contacted me with similar information. More disturbingly, some of these writers had evidence that their paper book royalties were also significantly wrong. Writers contacted their writers’ organizations. Agents got the news. Everyone in the industry, it seemed, read those blogs, and many of the writers/agents/organizations vowed to do something. And some of them did. I hoped to do an update within a few weeks after the initial post. I thought my update would come no later than summer of 2011. I had no idea the update would take a year, … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: One Phone Call From Our Knees

The Business Rusch: One Phone Call From Our Knees Kristine Kathryn Rusch   In 2009, Mat Kearney came out with a song called Closer to Love, which is, apparently, a favorite of the DJs on the station I listen to. It still plays in rather heavy rotation for an older song, and I hear it at least once a week. The song isn’t one of my favorites, but it has a line that stops me every time I hear it, because it’s so true. We are, as Kearney states, just a phone call from our knees. Dean and I have had those calls throughout our lives together—when my father died, when Dean’s stepfather died. The calls that just take your every day life and turn it into a completely new life, one that changes things … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: The Changing Definition of Publishing

The Business Rusch: The Changing Definition of Publishing Kristine Kathryn Rusch   This week, the announcements for the Pulitzer Prize shocked the publishing world because, for some reason, the Pulitzer board declined to chose a winner from the three fiction nominees. Lost in the controversy (besides the hurt feelings of the fiction nominees and the fact that no award was given in the editorial writing category either) was the fact that David Wood won in the National Reporting category for a series he published in  The Huffington Post. A few news outlets mentioned this, but very few, because it scared them. And because they really prefer a juicy, meaty, why-the-hell-didn’t-these-novels-measure-up scandal. What’s so important about Wood’s win? It marks the first time that an online-only outlet won in the national reporting category. Or as Rem … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: Writers And The DOJ Lawsuit

The Business Rusch: Writers and The DOJ Lawsuit Kristine Kathryn Rusch This week, the Department of Justice filed its lawsuit against Apple and five publishers. Three publishers settled immediately with two, as of this writing, going forward—Penguin and MacMillan. I am not a lawyer, so I cannot comment on the filing.  A few have, including Charles Petit on his website. He points out various things not discussed in the filing, how the filing shows multiple hands on the complaint (legal and “policy wonks”), and talks about other publishing concerns. The story hit all the major news outlets. Let me caution you as you read these news articles: reporters are generalists. They have to be or they can’t do their jobs well. As generalists, they must rely on “experts” and “analysts” to interpret a news … Read entire article »

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Recommended Reading List: March, 2012

I was extremely busy in March, but somehow I managed to read a lot of good stuff as well. Some of my reading came at a workshop at the end of February, beginning of March. If the stories that I liked appear in print, I told the students to contact me with that information. So far, only one has, but I hope others will so that I can share with you. I managed to catch up (sort of) on my nonfiction magazine reading (often at the expense of my newspaper reading), so I have quite a few magazine pieces below. I started some short story anthologies and some nonfiction anthologies, and I’m reading them slowly. I’ve listed some things below, and I’ll recommend others as time goes on (and I get … Read entire article »

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The Business Rusch: Audience

  The Business Rusch: Audience Kristine Kathryn Rusch   Ah, the sound of bubbles bursting.  On television, bursting bubbles have an audible “pop!” so loud it almost sounds like a gunshot. In real life, bubbles make almost no sound as they pop, maybe a faint little wet smack as they cease to be, barely louder than a kiss. Bubbles really are an apt analogy for dreams. Children get a jar of bubble water, often from a well-meaning adult who then shows the children how to make bubbles. First, dip the round wand into the bubble water, then blow gently, and watch the bubbles—catching light like a thousand rainbows—drift slowly away. Don’t touch them, because they’ll pop, sometimes spraying you with their remains. And even if you make new bubbles, they’ll never ever be quite the … Read entire article »

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