The SPARREW Newsletter Now Has Its Own Site!

 

 

When I started the SPARREW Newsletter in 2022, I had no idea or expectation that it would grow as large as it has today. I thought it would just be a simple little monthly newsletter that would exist only in a subscriber’s inbox.

 

But now, almost four years later, the SPARREW Newsletter has grown so big that not only did I need to set up an archive of past issues somewhere (which you can read here), but I realized that this mighty newsletter needed its own website.

 

In fact, I have known this for several months.

 

Lots of other newsletters have their own website. FundsforWriters. WritersWeekly. Authors Publish.

 

I realized the SPARREW Newsletter needed one too. But how was I going to make that happen?

 

I spent those months mulling over my options. I also reached out to the Tricky Edits contributor, Carolyn Howard-Johnson, to see if she had any ideas.

 

I thought about using Substack, because of the ease of organization, but I didn’t like the idea of my newsletter being posted on a site that I didn’t own.

 

No, I had to put it on a site that I owned. So I just stuck to the “dmcwriter” site I already had set up.

 

But even on there, the newsletter was growing too! It became part newsletter site, part writing portfolio site.

 

Meanwhile, I wasn’t sure how everyone I interviewed on there felt about that. Mostly, how they felt about the domain name not matching the newsletter’s name.

 

And ever since someone turned down being interviewed for the newsletter after I showed him the site the newsletter is posted on, I have always wondered if it’s because of that. (Or because my little newsletter is not so popular.)

 

That idea lingered in my brain. While I understood that the newsletter should be on a site with a matching domain name, I couldn’t figure out how to separate the newsletter from the writer.

 

Well, Life figured that out for me! It’s like Life said, “For goodness sake, if you can’t figure out how to do it, I’ll show you!”

 

So, recently, something messed up the DNS connection I had between the dmcwriter domain name and the site I had set up on another hosting platform. I am not very tech savvy, so I had a hard time figuring out what was going on AND how to fix it. And because I was using two different sites for the domain name and the hosting, I kept going back and forth between Customer Support for both sites, as well as the help guide links they sent to me, as I attempted to fix this problem and get the site I created back online. It went on for several days and I was increasingly frustrated that I kept running into dead ends, that I decided, screw it, I’ll just purchase a domain name on the hosting site and connect it with the site I created on there.

 

Plus, it was getting confusing going back and forth between two different websites just to fix ONE website!

 

So I purchased a domain name that I felt was a good fit for not only the SPARREW Newsletter but all things SPARREW, since there’s going to be some merch as well: SPARREW Site.

 

And at first, I was thinking of removing ALL of my credits as both a freelance writer and as a book reviewer, but then I realized something: What if visitors to the site want to know just who this Dawn Colclasure person is? I say on the About page that I started the newsletter in 2022. Okay, who am I to be publishing such a newsletter? I talk the talk, but do I walk the walk?

 

I certainly do!

 

I took a break from self-publishing books for a while there, but now I self-publish a title every once in a while.

 

I am an author, and the link to my books is on the About page.

 

I am certainly a reader (booklover), as my friends and followers on Facebook and BlueSky have seen when I have shared pages from my reading log.

 

I am a book reviewer, and the link to my book reviews can be found on that site, in the navigation bar.

 

I have experience working as an editor, and I share this information on the About page.

 

And, of course, I’m a writer. Proof is on the portfolio page that is also included on the navigation bar.

 

So, if people want to know if I’m the right person to be publishing a newsletter for self-published authors, authors, readers, reviewers, editors and writers, the proof is all there.

 

And you know what? I am going to leave it all there, too.

 

I don’t know what I’ll do with the dmcwriter domain name in the meantime. As it stands, while I own it, I can’t do anything with it. I tried, but so far, no luck. And that’s the next problem that I have to fix! At least I can work on it in my free time.

 

UPDATE:

New dmcwriter site just dropped! 

Is it even worth it to write for the Internet anymore?

One of the things I have on my to-do list for the weekends is to update my website. That is, I should normally update the site on the weekends. Sometimes, my weekends get too crazy and I don’t have the time. But, time permitting, I make it a point to update the ol’ site.

Unfortunately, there’s not a whole lot of time available for website updates. I’ve got other things on that to-do list I plan to tackle. Plus, like I said, things can get busy on the weekends. With this in mind, I dreaded the task of updating one page in particular on my website. This page has a ton of links on it and I knew many of those links no longer worked. Not too long ago, I spent some time giving my site a HUGE overhaul and got rid of a lot of old or inactive links and items. This page did not get an update, however, but I knew that still had to get done.

Well, today, I got that done. I knew I would have to remove a lot of dead links, but I was not expecting such a large number. All told, I removed the links to 34 articles, poems and book reviews. These sites are no longer active or the site owners just removed those particular items. Some were replaced with similar work written by other writers.

And while 34 may not seem very much to some people, it was more than enough for me. I take pride in having had so much of my work published, and now that’s 34 articles, poems and book reviews gone forever. (Believe me, I have removed A LOT more in the past after one site shut down.) I can no longer say I wrote over 80 articles for one site in particular, because now that number has dwindled.

And unfortunately, prospective editors I’d love to work with or agents or future clients may happen to notice. That number of active links to work online will get smaller and smaller in the future, and then it won’t seem like I’ve had much published online at all.

The fact that I had to delete these items does not bother me – I know that nothing lasts forever so I accept these disappearances. But it still would be nice if that article was still out there or that poem was still out there. In print. Forever. But because it’s on the Internet, it won’t be.

Nothing on the Internet lasts forever.

This made me wonder if it’s even worth it to write for the Internet anymore. I mean, if my work will eventually disappear, then why bother? Why go to the trouble? I would rather invest my time in writing and selling something that lasts forever. Not something that will disappear after a site shuts down.

I have several copies of the SIGNews newspaper, a newspaper I once wrote for, and they are in a crate in my garage. They may not be visible to everyone who might see them, but my articles are still in them. They are still there.

I also have copies of magazines my short story, poetry, essays and articles have appeared in. Their sites don’t exist anymore, but my work is still in the magazines. They’re still there!

The same could not be said of everything I have published on the Internet. All that stuff on that page will disappear at some point. Then I can’t really say I wrote all that stuff – unless I print it all out and actually show it to someone. Or I could save them all in one PDF file and keep it on my site. But even then, is it even worth the trouble to archive anything on my site? Will anybody even care anymore? Because, let’s face it: New stuff will be out there! This will all be old stuff.

This is why I prefer to write books over Internet content. Books have a stronger sense of permanency. They may be removed from the market at some point, but we have a way of getting them back out there again. Books actually last. The articles I write on the Internet won’t last, and the book reviews won’t last. But my books will. I’ll still have my own copies, anyway. My books will always exist no matter what happens. But the stuff I write for the Internet sure won’t.

Perhaps this explains my recent withdrawal from soliciting online markets. Doesn’t seem like I should go to the trouble of trying to write for online markets anymore if everything that I write is going to eventually disappear.

Lots of work to keep me busy

Recently, I updated the “Current Projects” page on my web site. This list includes books I am currently working on that may or may not be under contract. Nevertheless, I am still working on them all the same.

The list looked something like this:

• Writing a book on haunted cities.

• Writing a MG paranormal mystery series. (Currently revising Book One.)

• Writing a book on prayer. Working title: The Praying Life. (Ongoing.)

• Writing a health book on making positive changes in your life. Working title: Change Your Life NOW! (Ongoing)

• Co-writing a book with Martha Jette on alien abductions titled Terror in the Night. (Ongoing.)

• Wrote a children's book about upcycling. (Illustrations pending.)
  

As I reviewed that list after that site went live again, it struck me that I was juggling 6 books at a time.

Wow! Six books?? Really?

I try to keep that number low. But, alas, that has not happened.

What was a small book that I thought I’d just whip together and throw out to my publisher ended up becoming a BIGGER project. New chapters have been added and more research will need to be done. So this is a book project that is actually going to take me a while to complete.

And while I had plans to submit a book every month this year, it seems those plans have been changed, as well. I won’t be able to complete everything in time to have a submission ready to go for this month as well as following months, so I no longer will be submitting something every month for the rest of the year.

Also, because I work offline as well as online, I keep printouts of incomplete work in my “writing notebook.” This way, I can pull something out when I have the time (and the computer is not available) and work on it there. In order to stay on top of things, I made a list of all of the ongoing and nearly-complete book projects I am currently working on. This list of projects includes books I am not planning to submit for several months (like late next year).

And that list looked pretty different from what’s on my web site!

Because, it turns out, I have other ongoing book projects as well:

• A poetry book for soldiers

• The essay collection on deaf parenting (I am adding new essays)

• The second and third installment in the “Revise Your Writing” series (I count this as one manuscript).

• Another poetry book (Wandering Soul – it is semi-finished but I am leaving this one “open” in case I want to add more poems).

So, in essence, that is 10 books altogether which I am juggling.

Wow! Ten!

Of course, this does not mean that some projects will “slip through the cracks.” Some books take priority over the others (haunted cities, Terror in the Night, revising the first GHOST Group book and the health book), and when I have work for them, I will of course make that book a priority and work on it as often as I can.

And, at least in this way, I will ALWAYS have work to do. As it is, while I’ve worked on the GG revisions, the health book, TITN and haunted cities, I’ve had essays for the deaf parenting book stuck in my head for days, as well as ideas for stuff to write/research for the praying book. So I will get around to getting caught up on that eventually. There is work waiting for me, all right. More book work. A lot of book work, actually.

A friend once remarked that being an author is a lot like a job for me. Boy, she wasn’t kidding. Maybe it’s not so bad that I can’t get a job or a gig right now, or that the publishing company doesn’t have any manuscripts for me to edit right now. Because right now, I am indeed busy with this “job.” (I am also a mother, housekeeper, chief cook, bottle washer...) The only difference is that anything I earn for this job will come to me long after they are complete and published, and not before.

Author sites: Are pictures important?

I am putting together an author site for my books. This site will be completely different from the dmcwriter site. The dmcwriter site will be more of a "writer's" site, and this one will just be about my books.

I was thinking of putting my pic on the homepage. Nothing glamorous, mind you. Just a pic of what I look like! I think people are curious about what authors look like. (I know I am!) And it's nice to have a face to go with the name.

However, my husband is against me posting my pic on that site. Which is something I don't understand, really. I said, "I won't wear my glasses for the pic." I won't show my whole face! Heck, I'll even wear a baseball cap and shades! Not good enough.

Still, I think a pic should be on there. Somewhere or another.

My pic's on my MySpace, on my deviantART page and even on the dmcwriter site. It's not like people don't already know what I look like! I'm not exactly proud of how my face looks. I don't really think I have a beautiful face that should be plastered EVERYWHERE. But it is my face. It's what I look like. So why not have a pic on my site? I think people appreciate something like that. Adds a "human" feel to the site, ya know?

But if not on the homepage, at least somewhere on the site.

We'll see what happens, I suppose.