Discovered in the Wrapping Paper - Day 12 - Liz Bradford online!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

There are a few things to unwrap today, and the first one is the announcement that precedes the others. I'm very happy to say that Liz Bradford, a Pros writer whose stories have only been available in zines until now, is going online! Yeay! Liz's stories were published in the Gryphon Press zines - the Unprofessional Conduct series, and Celebrations, and she also has a zine novel called Sorceror's Web which I've always thoroughly enjoyed reading.

The only problem is, as we were in the middle of talking about getting her stories sorted, she discovered that her old computer had given up the ghost - and it wasn't possible to recover her Prosfic from the drive, which is a fandom tragedy! I currently have four stories that can be posted, and I hope to get in touch with Cherilyn (ankh_lj - *waves hopefully*) about the stories they wrote together - in fact this was all ongoing way back in September and then I was smacked around the head with a triple-whammy of Job 2, and my side of it all fell apart rather. Familiar story I know, but... back now! *g* As far as I know, these are Liz's stories:

The Breaking Point - Unprofessional Conduct 5
Hiding the Truth - Unprofessional Conduct 6.
Sweet Nothings - Celebrations 2

The Fan by Dee Bow (sequel to Cherilyn's Dream Lover) - Unprofessional Conduct 6.

The Sorcerer's Web (zine novel)

I Spy (with Cherilyn) - Unprofessional Conduct 8
Look No Hands (with Cherilyn) - Unprofessional Conduct 7

If you know of any more, please do let me know so that we can include them in her story archive.

It will take a little while to get Liz's AO3 account set up, but in meantime she's happy for me to post stories here for you - and for them to be archived to ProsLib - so please find your current favourite cup of cosy and a good soft place to cuddle down with today's Prosfic. *g* (I'll be sending her links to these posts, so do please feel free to comment to her here about her stories *g*)

Comments

[ali15son.livejournal.com]

It would be lovely to see "The Scorceror's web" online, having recently read the zine, i give it a huge thumbs up.

Thankyou and sorry my first comment came out wrong.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

It's a great zine, isn't it — I thought of you as I was making the post. *g* Sadly it's the one file I've not been able to find a copy of anywhere, so I think it's going to have to be re-typed, which will no doubt take a bit longer... But we'll get there! *g*

And no worries about the comment - though I admit I was thrown when I came to reply a while ago and it had vanished!! *g* 😆

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

I can help you retype if you need to but can't we just scan the zine and convert it to text? I haven't done that but I do know it can be done. :) Thanks for doing this.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

In theory someone could scan the zine and convert it to text, but it sounds much easier saying it than actually doing it, unfortunately. I do have a little printer that also scans and does OCR, but it's a hugely fiddly business. You have to sit at the flatbed, and carefully place each page of the zine on it in such a way that the page is as flat as possible (because the zine is perfect-bound, not comb or spiral bound). Then you have to hold it down flat while the scanner makes its slow way up and down the page. Then you have to reach over to the laptop, tell the software you've got another page, and start all over again with the carefull placement. Then do the whole thing a couple of hundred times! I do scan stuff, but half the time I'm thinking it would be much faster just to re-type it!

So if someone has the zine and a better scanner than mine, and is prepared to do all that so that the OCR can then be carefully checked before posting, then that would be very welcome!

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

It sounds like a long process. One would think these days it would be quicker! I'd have to experiment since I haven't done it and have no idea if my printer is able to do it efficiently.

Have a great Holiday and thanks again for all your hard work.

[tinturtle]

I would help transcribe, too, or help check the results of optical character recognition.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Like I said above to Kat, if someone has better technology than mine for scanning then that would be very welcome, but otherwise scanning actually takes even longer than typing, it feels!

[tinturtle]

There are ways to do it with a phone or tablet camera that might be faster. I don't have the zine, though, so I can't volunteer to do that. (Not having the zine would also be an obstacle in helping with transcription, of course, if creating images is more hassle than retyping. I didn't think of that. Still up for checking OCR if someone takes it on, though.)

[tinturtle]

This is me going to sleep.

[f-m-parkinson.livejournal.com]

Great news that Liz Bradford's stories are going online.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Isn't it! *g*

And your own - albeit slowly... *g*

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

Oh, what great news! Thank you both!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Isn't it fab! *g*

[shooting2kill.livejournal.com]

Well done and thank you for all the work involved and to Liz Bradford. It's always great to see zine stories come online.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

You're welcome - isn't it great her stories will be online! *g*

[milomaus.livejournal.com]

What a treat! Thank you both so very much, these are fabulous News!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Isn't it wonderful! *g*

[krisserci5.livejournal.com]

wonderful news. I love when an author goes on ao3 for the ability to down load in so many formats.

Thank you both

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the different formats on AO3 are great - it's just a shame it helped to shatter little fandoms like ours into tinier pieces...

[msmoat.livejournal.com]

Catching up here: yay! This is great news! Thank you (and her, and everyone)!

[hagsrus.livejournal.com]

Happy happy!!