Crossword Puzzle - August 2013

Welcome to the crossword puzzle for August 2013! Can you believe that it's been a month already?

As per usual (or if you're new here), the answers to the puzzle below will be posted next week Tuesday, 3 September 2013. If you'd like to be mentioned in that post, then play the game! Print the crossword out, or scribble on it electronically, and submit your answers (either the completed image, or just a list of question numbers and answers) to me via either Twitter mention or a message on my Facebook Page. Do not enter your answers in the comments below, or punch them onto my Facebook wall: you'll spoil the fun for everybody else!

I will post the name of the first person to give me the answers correctly before next Tuesday. Good luck!

Oh and P.S., if you'd like to receive the crossword puzzle each month, as soon as it's posted, then enter your e-mail address in the box on the Contact page, to subscribe to my free monthly newsletter.

So without further ado, here's this month's puzzle:

Across
1 Kind of clay used as a building material, typically in the form of sun-dried bricks (5)
4 Praise and honor received for an achievement (5)
7 Irritate or annoy (3)
8 Lover of Queen Guinevere (8)
9 Person who leads prayers in a mosque (4)
11 Professional fool at medieval court (6)
13 Book of financial accounts (6)
14 Holiday celebrating the birth of Christ (4)
18 Defensive walls (8)
19 Shout of welcome or farewell (3)
20 Person who tunes pianos (5)
21 Board used to spell out supernatural messages (5)
Down
1 Offer an excuse or defense (5)
2 Industrial city in California (7)
3 Software license agreement (4)
4 More exciting or fashionable (7)
5 Stupid person (4)
6 Large, long-haired breed of dog (6)
10 Creature with torso of man and legs of horse (7)
12 Kettle Drums (7)
13 Comitted to memory (6)
15 Biblical name of Saba (5)
16 Event regarded as a portent of good or evil (4)
17 Capital of Norway (4)

Bubbling Books?

This past weekend, somebody suggested in a writers group that I belong to, that I upload my book to a new site, called Bublish. I clicked, and had a look.

It seems like a pretty good idea, although creating my bubble wasn't as straightforward as I'd have liked. The service is still in Beta though, so I'm sure it'll get better and better.

The site allows readers to browse through book "bubbles", containing cover art, excerpts, insights from the authors, and buy links to take them directly to the book's page at the top-rated retailers.

Here's my bubble on the site:

The site also does a lot of work marketing their bubbles. I was featured twice yesterday in their tweet timeline, and again today in their "floating bookshelf".

I'm yet to see if it'll help me to sell more copies, but it's a novel concept, and I hope it takes off!

Update: To listen to me speaking about Bublish, click the Play button below:

Review: Author 2.0 Blueprint

So I finally got around to reading the Author 2.0 Blueprint by Joanna Penn. You can get it for free just by subscribing to her blog at http://www.thecreativepenn.com/.

I'm afraid that I gushed. A lot.

I can't think of anything more to say, than what I already said in my review over on Goodreads, so I'm just going to copy that:

Wow! There's a lot of information in here to digest!

Joanna Penn talks candidly about what it takes to be an author in this brave new world of the Internet, in which we find ourselves. She calls the author of this Web 2.0 world the "Author 2.0", quite aptly, I'd say.

This short book explains everything you need to do to make a successful career out of writing, from writing (duh) to marketing, to business management. There are tons of links throughout, to useful articles, blog posts, podcasts and videos, most of them free. She also advertises her paid courses, for more indepth coverage of certain topics, but I'll forgive those plugs because the manual that she has written stands on its own perfectly well without them.

I'll definitely be going back to it time and time again as I progress on my journey as an author, and I'll be clicking on all those links that I simply didn't have time to click!

I really think that this free volume should be required reading for anyone serious about their writing journey!

Honestly, you wanna be a writer? Read this book!

Update: To listen to me speaking about the Author 2.0 Blueprint, click the Play button below:

Crossword Puzzle - July 2013 Answers

Herewith, the answers for the July 2013 crossword puzzle.

I was told that this month's clues were a bit "esoteric". Who else feels that way? how did you all do? Hope at least a few people got close! Please add your comments below; I'd love to hear how you enjoyed this month's puzzle!