Author Archives: Blaze

20220926

Leave a reply

[Reminder that Patreon posts lag two weeks. See details at the bottom if you want your news faster.]

Monday. A real Monday, even, weird as that might be. Spent the last two driving all day, so I didn’t get to have my normal Monday. Been good so far (the day is early). Got up, went down and got breakfast. Hit the archery range and shot pretty well for missing several weeks in a row. Did some CPL Tai Chi and that’s not all that rusty. Will dig out the sword later and work on those forms.
All in all, trying (TRYING!) to get back to some semblance of normalcy. Really been off track since we started getting ready for Minneapolis. Travel. Return. Travel some more. Home for a while, I hope. Good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise.
Finished the second Corsac Fox novel last week. Like how it turned out. Also started working on the design and setup of the Kickstarter coming in late November. Commissioning some art. Setting tiers, goals, and wishlists. Trying to keep it compact enough that I can learn, but big enough that it could explode.
[Every time you push the publish button—EVERY TIME—there is a chance that you hit the magic number where the book you’ve put out suddenly captures the zeitgeist and explodes. At which point, you better write a bunch more of them, because fans will have demands and expectations. Write things you love, so you can enjoy making a career out of a throwaway, m’kay?]
Also wrote the third Fatima short story. Not as thrilled with it. Mostly I need to go back and amp up the tension. Story is there. Characters are rich. The tension isn’t high enough for the target audience. Middle of the night I woke up with a list of fixes I’ll work on this week.
Did not sleep worth a damn on Saturday night. Woke up Sunday more or less a zombie in many ways. Did write, but that was a newsletter for this week, and a Milestone article for next. Non-fiction, where I can just let back-brain roll downhill and the words will be good enough for when I do have cognitive abilities to fix things.
Then I hit a blank spot. Seriously. It happens. Write too much, and don’t have any deadlines looming in front of me. Or write too many of one thing and can’t immediately figure out what the palate cleanser is.
Those of you who’ve been listening to me for long enough know that I tend to cycle back and forth. Light/dark. Military/pirates. Space/ground. SF/non-SF.
I have written a bunch of space opera lately. Or at least space adventure, between Marrakesh, Corsac Fox, and Last Stand. Needed a break. Wasn’t sure what it was.
Then, on the drive to the range, writer-brain whispered possibly the most dangerous term.
“Derlyth.”
I have two of them done. Just got #2 back from the copy-editor this morning, which was why it was on my mind. Went shooting to practice my zen, as one does, And to let back-brain marinate on concepts.
Derlyth is a fun character, because he is richly deep. Evil, but only somewhat. And forced to deal with certain things because there are lines that he will draw and not cross. (In book two, he had to end up saving a bunch of rich toffs he rather disliked, because his opponent was a servant of true chaos in the vein of Batman’s Joker, intent on sowing chaos and destruction in his wake. Being an imperialist running dog was about as insulting to Derlyth as one could get. And he had to do it, because nobody else could save the world.)
So I’m about to start book three shortly. Writing this first because I needed some time to digest a few notes written earlier and turn them into enough of a plot that I could write an opening. I do write into darkness occasionally, but it works better (faster!) when I have things mostly worked out to some degree. Or at least can get rolling, then let writer-brain work it all out over the course of the next few days.
Looking at the refrigerator, the Derlyth books are scheduled for release in June. My goal is all three of them at once, while also publishing the sixth Last Stand book (tentative title: Emergency!). Reminder to y’all that I’m planning to publish one Last Stand novella each month next year (I have seven of them done and will likely write eight next), plus at least one other thing. It will be Action/Adventure first, then Corsac Fox Book One in April, then Labyrinth in May, Derlyth(*) in June, and SF for the rest of the year, including Kincaide’s War #2, three Marrakesh novels, Corsac Fox Book Two, and another Science Officer in December.
On the back of the napkin, I’m going to put out at least 32 major titles next year, not counting anything short like collections. I’d ask what the hell I thought I was thinking, but I already knew that. Gotta empty the trunk.
Other news!
Okay, reminder that I’m from Kansas originally. We don’t have trees there, not counting hedge apples that mark farming sections. Saturday night, the Fabulous Publisher Babe™ was walking across the yard from the hydroponics and got me up off the couch when she got in to look out the window.
Across the septic field are trees. Lots of them. All kinds (I don’t know trees unless I can identify the fruit, generally). Sitting on a branch, about ten feet up, was an owl. Maybe eighteen inches tall. Brown. Dark, so I couldn’t see all that much, except when the head rotated and twisted.
Kinda cool. I have had owls around here. Probably seen or heard them less than a handful of times, but that’s mostly because my house is built so solidly that I don’t hear things outside. (Not counting Jimmy, when he races right by my bedroom wall at three in the morning, after God knows what.)
Owls have always fascinated me, but it was too dark to take a picture, so you’ll just have to imagine it. Same with the Snowy Owl I saw several years ago, when she swooped up and landed on a roadsign as I was driving at night. Really cool.
More news: I think I will have to now describe the neighborhood horse as migratory. With all that implies. Haven’t found any poop surprises in the yard over the last week, so he might only come down off the hill in the summer. Or something. Never seen him outside of that, going back several years on reflection. So now the fool migrates as well.
How weird are the critters in your neighborhood?
Shade and sweet water,
b
West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published two weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

20220918

Leave a reply

(Editor’s Note: There is a lag here, obviously)

I’m writing this from Lincoln City, Oregon, on a Sunday morning instead of the usual Monday. Will post it tomorrow while I’m driving home. Been meeting with some folks down here to talk about stuff.


Nothing formal. Mostly getting together with some folks I haven’t seen since before the world ended and catching up. They just all happen to be writers.
And, as happens, we talked business and other things. Mostly sharing what worked recently and what didn’t. What they’d tried and how that had worked out for them.
One of the things I heard about was how one friend was writing an essay on Patreon that they immediately shared on Substack, then launched out on their main blog two weeks later. They write more essays and less about the “peek behind the curtain” than I do but the idea resonated with me and I intend to implement it going forward. This will post on 9/19. Then it will show up over on the bw blog on 10/3. With that in mind, I plan to “adjust” my focus on the Patreon blog a bit.
In the past, I talked about the nuts and bolts. I also have too many newsletters that I keep up with. Publishing news. Anti-Stodgy/Redneck Chef. Cole Braddock for those folks. Milestone Indie Publishing for a different group. Boundary Shock Quarterly every three months.
The main BW blog has suffered, and I needed to do something about that. So more interaction on both, and less separation.
That was the other part of usefulness from spending a couple of days hanging out with old friends. Rejuvenation of the creative side of things. As writers, we often work without people around. Stay home and write, a bit oblivious to the outside world.
Then a pandemic hit and not a lot changed for most of us, even though everybody else had their lives upended. Everyone was at home. We need to get out and see folks more. Talk. Something.
Something that someone else mentioned was how much the next generations are less about having to jump onto media trends because of an artificial scarcity model. In the old days, you saw the book on the shelf and had to immediately buy it, because you might never see it again unless it was a mega-seller. It went onto the TBR pile, and you’d get to it.
Same thing happened with television for us oldsters. It was on and you watched it, or you missed it and hoped to get it on reruns or syndication. VCRs were okay, but remembering to program them was the issue. DVRs kind of helped, but then the world changed and people got into primitive streaming (Netflix dvds in the mail) or actual streaming (all the services you pay for each month, in order to watch your various shows).
For a time, folks would binge, because all of a whole season would drop at once, and folks would consume it. The problem was that the show disappeared from the public dialogue about three weeks later.
Nowadays, the media conglomerates drop 1-3 episodes at once, then feed the rest through on a weekly basis to create that artificial scarcity that you have to think about it and wait for it, instead of consuming when you want it.
But that won’t work.
Another friend ignores those shows until they complete a season run dropped, then binges them, but she’s off-schedule with folks that are tracking it weekly.
Others might wait until a show is complete (because most only run 1-2 seasons anyway these days) then catch all of it, but only if the cultural decision is good. (If you didn’t watch Game of Thrones when it was on, would you really start it from scratch today, knowing how badly they ended it?)
Fans do not have to consume something now. They can time-shift it how they want. Artists (us) have to take that into account. For writers, we put things up on all the major distributors (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, Kobo, D2D, etc.).
Some folks will read it immediately. Captain Daring #3 has been out for 9 days and has 30 ratings on Amazon at this moment when I checked. I’m seeing a surge in sails of book one (of a trilogy) now that all three are done, because folks wanted to binge on them, instead of reading them once per month.
Friday, somebody bought all seven Lazarus books in paper at the same time. The complete set. It’s been out for a while. I don’t know if they sampled and said “YES!” or read them in ebook format originally then decided that they wanted them on their shelf. Something
Doesn’t matter. Fan get to decide when they want to consume media. And as creatives, it is our responsibility to serve that need. That means Catalog instead of Back-list. It means interacting whenever we can, regardless of how introverted some of us are. There are fan expectations to be met.
For now, that means trying new things to see if A) I like doing it, and B) it might move the needle in terms of new fans.
So I have a question for you folks, as I’m driving home.
I’ve thought about doing basic videos of me reading short stories and samples of longer pieces. Put them up on YouTube or Tiktok. (Or wherever.) And I’m not talking audio books with a lot of professional editing and polish. I’m talking about me, turning on the camera, sitting in my blue chair, and reading something, so all the errors, all the profanities (I tend to swear like a sailor) and all the everything you’d get from me doing a live, public reading.
Short stuff is probably a five minute video. Or a good chunk of some fun chapter, like the one I just did this week as part of Corsac Fox #2. I was giggling as I reread it, because a fairly minor character got his moment to shine and was complaining about how Tuesday his week had gone.
It was great.
Dunno your general ages, those of you reading this, so I don’t know if you are a representative sample. But is that something you might enjoy? No offense, but I don’t my fan base to grow old and die on me, like happens to some writers. I want to bring in a lot of younger folks who will enjoy my take on things and keep me in kittie kibble for a long time.
So you, yes you, hit reply and say yay or nay to watching me commit audios of some of the short fiction I have that even you haven’t read (or heard). And then go ask your kids or grandkids who are into SF what they think.
At the end of the day, the phrase I heard that best sums all this up is “Fan-funded-fiction” and I want to make sure that you’re happy. And happy to keep funding me to create new things.
—————————-
And thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!
If you’re reading the free version (which is published two weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

Yer Gonna See Some Changes Around Here…

Leave a reply

Went to a retreat last week with a group of writers. It involved a long drive there and back again, so Fabulous Publisher Babe™ and I had time to talk business, because that’s what we do on long drives.

The trip down to Oregon to see the eclipse spawned Boundary Shock Quarterly, for instance. Another drive created Mystery, Crime, and Mayhem.

So we talked.

I have a Kickstarter project planned for late November. Corsac Fox #1. (Just finished writing #2 ten minutes ago.)

And we just moved webhosts last week from a place that wasn’t all that great to a new company that puts money into customer service in ways that has her raving.

Last week, someone at the retreat suggested that FB and certain social media platforms were for old people. That youth might have an FB page, but it was to talk to grandma. (Ouch) They are living in other places. so I’m researching where they are, so I can get my books in front of them.

If you are under 34, or have experts you or I can tap, I’d like to talk to you/them about those sorts of things. I’d rather be authentically me than put on a facade, but that’s me.

One of the themes was engagement, and force-muliplying things. What will come out of that for this blog is that there will be changes coming. In fact, they have already begun.

I have a patreon where folks who pay me a buck a month get a weekly blog about life and writing. Lots of nuts and bolts, but other things. Every Monday, going on several years now. They also get the Anti-Stodgy/Redneck Chef newsletter monthly. (For folks at the $5 level, they get a new story guaranteed at least six months before I publish it. Sometimes a year or two, depending. You should join them.)

New stuff. “Fan-funded-fiction”

This blog has kinda paled, with all the newsletters and stuff I have to write from a marketing perspective every month, but that’s going to change soon. When I post a blog to the patreon folks, it will be put on a timer, and come out here two weeks later. You’ll see the same news, but lagged half a month. Plus a few other things, but I’m trying to move to a space where I write it one time, then send it out to a variety of places, some of whom are paying and helping me keep the lights on.

This is your warning, when it happens the first time in October. Heh.

I’m also planning some changes around here. We’ve moved hosts, and hired a developer to make a much prettier theme than we’ve had in the past. And we’re going to have a single store where folks can buy books and things, but it will go over on the corporate site (https://www.knottedroadpress.com/) so we don’t have to do things three times.

And the goal is to put new fiction over there at the same time it goes up elsewhere. At least ebooks for now, with the possibility of paper later. Plus maybe a few collectible editions, like special hardcovers or the like, depending on fan interest.

Part of the Kickstarter is to gauge interest in that sort of thing, at the same time as I am still trying to find new ways to build up my fan base. (There are a lot of things I’d like to do, but most of them cost more money than I can justify, like additional translations, additional audio, or manga transcriptions of existing products. If any of you feel like backing those sorts of things directly, reach out.)

The hope with the KS is that we make enough cash to make some strategic investments. I’m hoping I can convince all y’all to help spread the word when it comes, so that we blow the top off of things and I can get crazy with it.

That’s all coming. Don’t know how soon, but you’ll see new functions and features on this website slowly (and probably quietly initially) rolling out. Be on the lookout.

And I really do want to hear from you. What do you want from the bw experience? What things could I do or add to the website that would meet your specific desires? Contrary to popular opinion, I am not a mind-reader. You gotta tell me. Using your words, because I also such at interpretive dance.

Clear enough?

Good.

Thanks for supporting me for all these years. I hate the idea of having to put on shoes, so writing is what I’d like my retirement to be. I got a lot of stories to tell, and I need your help getting there.

Spread the word. And let me know what I can do.

Please?

 

Shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

Planning for 2023

Leave a reply

Did a Publisher Meeting this morning for breakfast. That’s where I get to take Fabulous Publisher Babe™ out and we talk business. Because that what we do. Talk business.

We started the weird part of the conversation talking about how one might handle passports and mail in an interstellar/galactic setting. Either you end up sending database updates of a passport system to every planet in the nation (with all the weakest-link risks to your data chain), or you end up reverting to mere paper credentials and trying to maintain local/planetary passports. Not sure.

But that inspired another Last Stand story while we were chatting. I have seven of those done right now, all novellas, with the longest (origin) running 31,000 words and the shortest at 17,000. The rest all come in around 22,000+/-, because that’s my target length for story and I’m generally pretty good at hitting length now that I have the groove.

AND THEN: as we were driving home she asked if we would be in a position to publish twelve Last Stand novellas next year. Jan-Dec. Then, as a secondary step, dropping something else every month.

I have not looked yet, but I am reasonably certain that I could, just with what’s in the can right now. (You will see me think on paper shortly.)

After all, in 2019, I intentionally wrote twenty novels. And then sixteen in 2020 and fifteen in 2021. I’ll actually come in under twelve (novels) in 2022, unless I push towards the end of the year, but that’s me writing a BUNCH of novellas (Last Stand, the Commander Machesky erotica novels under Cole Braddock, etc. Somewhere around a dozen already, and still going.) I’m pretty much on pace for the year, though I did take half of August off (and needed it).

Corsac Fox #1 will be part of my first-ever kickstart in December. I just started #2 this week. I have a pair of Marrakesh (military space adventure/opera) novels done, with plans for what the third will look like. The second monster in Kincaid’s war (160,000 words again) is done. On the Action/Adventure side, I have two Pacific Force novels done, plus an unrelated novella. On the “urban” fantasy side, I have two Derlyth novels done, plus Dan & Stewie.

That’s eleven, without even digging. If asked, that twelfth will be another Science Officer, because I know what the next one will be. And I might write two of those for next year. And maybe pull some more of the SF out of the trunk and focus the rest of this year on extending/finishing some of my current series.

(For example, most of you have never read Scour, because I only sent that novel out to my patreon backers and it might be for sale in the shop. I’d have to look to be sure and haven’t. Similarly, I have the first two of the five Giles/Taft Station novels done, and need to circle back. Plus a handful of short story collections that each form their own Novel One in a different series: Peter Najjar, Ollie, Yasmin, and Flight Officer Brannon. Seriously.)

So in 2023, y’all can expect me to drop TWO major projects every month, if all goes well. A wide selection of things. A lot of fun. I’ve been threatening it for a while, but the boss is the one that decides these things, and she has decided to move ahead on this as a project.

And mind you, I’m not even talking about five collections of short fiction I’ve put together, each about 60-70,000 words and assembling all the stuff I’ve been writing for my patreon or other projects over the last several years. Unless you are on my patreon, you haven’t read three-quarters of them. Don’t call yourself a completist without. 😉

And, today is September 4. I’ll write a second 80k Corsac Fox novel this month, plus two more shorts for side projects. That leaves me three more months to do stuff before January 1. I am not worried.

Instead, I plan to sit down with the boss this week and plot out an actual publishing schedule. Then write five more Last Stand books (I have seven in the can now, plus notes in twenty more) to make up a Season One Omnibus (1-12) for 2023. And map out what projects she wants to publish of the twenty things I could drop in to fill twelve slots behind Last Stand.

Y’all get in and hang on. 2023 is going to be a wild ride.

CONvergence After Action Report (#CVG2022)

Leave a reply

Okay, that was a ball. And a really busy con (see image below). (#CVG2022)

If I count it right, I had 17 panels over 4 days, out of 22 possible slots. (Didn’t let them schedule me past my 830-930pm slots. I needed my beauty sleep.) That’s amazingly busy, but it worked. I didn’t have any time slots where I had the space to wind down for very long, so I just stayed on for the four days.

It worked better for me that way, because I could plan to stay on.

There is a place on 14th street, a couple of blocks from the con hotel, called Eggy’s. Diner in a gentrified neighborhood, so a mix of classics with some hipster touches. We ate there twice.

First meal, I had the poutine breakfast, because she assured me that I was close enough to Canada that they would get it right. (They did.) Second time, I had an omelet with cheese, spinach, and chorizo. However, it being Minneapolis, it wasn’t very chorizo. Still good, though.

Other breakfast was Nicollet Diner, attached to a drag cabaret. I ordered the Seriously French Toast (croissants) but got the Fabulous French Toast (see image). Confused the guy by ordering blueberries with it, I think, but it was good and not worth sending back when it arrived.

Not as good as Eggy’s. Still good food. Eggy’s was constantly having people show up for take-out or delivery. I mean constantly while we ate. And they were full up on tables both times, with a half-dozen folks running around madly to serve everyone.

That’s usually a good sign of the food. It was worth it.

Had my first “real” signing as a pro at the con. One person showed up with books for me. Others had no idea who I was, but got suckered into taking pictures of my covers with signatures on them when I wasn’t charging anything. I am not a Big Name Author, so I wasn’t concerned that I was invisible. The staff were great and the fans were friendly.

Also had my first ever reading. Gave them the first three printed pages of Captain Daring. In the radio voice. Fans later asked why I didn’t do audio books. Don’t got time. Hell of a compliment, though.

Went well, and I think they will have the video on their website at some point, with me #2 of 4 guys reading on Sunday. Think I did pretty well. Folks showed up and nobody threw anything rotten at me.

Panels were awesome. Had one small one (4 fans, three panelists) but several were standing room only. (Topic, not me, but nice to be up there.) And one panelist sent me a note on Monday thanking me for how I moderated things, which was extra good. I always say that I give good panel. Nice to be recognized for it.

Only a handful of COVID positives notified, and each of those folks were able to be traced. One was at one of my panels, but I never took my mask off inside the building for four days, and only rarely outside. Still feeling well.

Plus, you had to show proof up up-to-date vaccinations to get your ticket in, and only one asshole walked around without his mask on half the time, but he was exactly the sort of putz you would expect, if I told you obnoxiously privileged old white libertarian guy.

Best part of the con for me was how young it was. Sure, old farts, but LOTS of youngsters. Not a lot of little ones, but teenagers and young adults, frequently in rotating cosplay outfits with style. Good questions, sharp on things.

Engaged.

Totally hoping they invite me back next year. Not a lot of writers on the track, so folks who are writers and want to make the trek to Minneapolis in early July 2023 ought to be able to get on panels. The Con-Comm are sharp, professional, and friendly as hell.

Everyone was friendly. Hands down the best group I’ve ever gotten to work with, as a working pro in attendance somewhere. Would like to make this my home con in the future. That’s how good it was.

Still recovering from the crazy, so a little light on details, but connected with some old friends, made some new ones, and had a ball.

See you next year!

b

Luna Di Luna

Leave a reply

So I’m in Minnesota. Staying in a suburb of Minneapolis called Eagan. Across the river on the south side. Yuppie suburb kind of place. Had lunch in Minneapolis Monday. Dinner and lunch Tuesday out here.

Last night, we got a little weird.

The Pizzafarmer lives in Minnesota. He was the inspiration for the Wilson Jaxx character in the original Nuns With Guns anthology. I have since written several more episodes, which will get published in the winter, as part of Boundary Shock Quarterly’s pirate issue. (Coming soon.)

So part of my trip was coordinating meeting all sorts of folks, some IRL for the first time (¾ so far).

Pizzafarmer lives way south. Like an hour out in one of the far distant cities on the way to Iowa.

He was coming up to take his car to the dealer, so we coordinated getting a beer afterwards.

The place was in Shakopee. Middle of a huge industrial part on the western edge of town. Badger Hill Brewing. Nifty joint

He’d gotten there early, and talked to folks about what he was up to. The afternoon bartender actually stayed after his shift to meet me, once he heard the story. I handed out business cards to folks, because I was there to meet the Pizzafarmer.

Then we sat and talked for an hour. It was lovely. And fun.

At that point, he needed to head south and we needed to get dinner, so Fabulous Publisher Babe(tm) and I wandered around looking for something. Eventually settled on wanting Italian.

First place we went was line out the door and literally no parking places anywhere in the lot. Didn’t go. Probably good.

Instead, she looked around for something and found Luna Di Luna on south Lyndale (8820 Lyndale Ave S, Bloomington, MN 55420).

My guess is that it was an old Burger King, in the era before drive-thru windows (I checked the exterior). Looking at the front, they left the big glass windows in place and built up coverings to mostly turn the interior into a lovely cottage while still letting in light.

The menu was one page of food, one page of white wines, and one page of red wines, with your choice of Red or White Sangria. That’s it.

Food was amazing. Small wine bar. Lovely people. Leftovers for lunch, but not a lot.

Inside was amazing, but I figured it would be rude to take pictures. Instead, you should make it a point to go. Real cheese. Great pasta. Fantastic people. Not even all that expensive.

Way better meal than that first place we’d have gone to. So happy that we ended up trying these folks.

If you make it to Minneapolis, make it to Luna Di Luna.

🙂

Bouncy

Leave a reply

I’m in Minnesota, counting down to CONvergence, which promises to be an utterly charming and awesome event. And I will not open myself up to so much work next year, assuming that they invite me back. (Seventeen things over four days, when I had honestly been expecting 6. That’s normal for a con, at least for me historically.)

I am an introvert. (Big surprise there, for anyone who knows me.)

At the same time, I am a player on a stage, and I have a lot of experience with that sort of thing, going back a long time of needing to assume masks for a variety of reasons. Most of them were unpleasant reasons, at that, but this is a con, and I simply need to be charming and massively extroverted for a few days.

Last time I did this was at Rose City Comic Con in 2018 (I think). Several of us had a single booth, with a lot of books for sale, organized by genre. The others with me did not have the ability to activate extrovert mode, so I took it on as a persona I call Carnival Barker.

Literally, standing at the corner and making eye contact with folks, then adding banter and charm to get them to step into the booth and look around. Exactly what a Carnival Barker does, without the freak show behind him. (No comments on my books, thank you. Heh.)

I did that for several days. To do it, I had to turn off the writer for that same period. Different mask. Different person.

Guess what, I’m back. We came into Minnesota a week early, which would have allowed us to see a lot of Fabulous Publisher Babe™’s family, except that COVID rippled through those families, so they isolated and we’ve stayed away.

I have managed to meet up with a few folks, having lunch with a fellow writer local I’ve never met IRL on Monday, and dinner with an old co-worker from Seattle last night. One of my online GMs lives not far away, and we’ll be doing lunch today.

With any luck, the guy who was the inspiration behind Pizzafarmer will be available later today for a beer. (Story #1 was in Nuns with Guns. Story #4 will be in Boundary Shock Quarterly 021 in the winter. I’ll publish 1-3 at the same time.) He lives around here somewhere (I don’t know MN geography all that well) and we’ve been emailing back and forth.

But I woke up this morning bouncy. That’s the extrovert coming to life. Getting ready to be ON for several days. Did manage to write some more on the second Marrakesh novel (Military Space Adventure along the lines of TOS or TNG, without the Epic Space Opera elements. More Mission-on-the-week sort of thing here) and hopefully will have words over the next day or so, before we move from the suburbs to downtown for the Con hotel.

Then I will be fully subsumed by the Barker, and off to the races.

I’ve warned everyone who would listen. And the Babe™ was at RCCC, so she saw it happen and understands me well enough to not be concerned that she’ll be sleeping with something of a stranger for a few days.

It happens. I am a creature of identity. Identities, plural, honestly.

I went into August understanding that I would be writing less. WAY less. Instead of my usual upper bound of 120,000 words, I have set it to 80,000 this month. And will stop cold if I actually manage to get there, what with a full week gap in the month.

That is the streak-breaking number, where I’m not even to Pulp Speed One, which I have managed since May 2018. Intentionally.

I won’t call it a vacation, but I’m taking time away from words. And doing odd projects instead. Lyrics for the rock opera. Planning for the Corsac Fox kickstarter in the winter. Being someone else.

I’m bouncy this morning, and it’s not the (yucky) coffee kicking in. Less than I usually drink back home, as a matter of fact.

Hopefully, some of you will be at the con. I have a signing on Friday around lunch, so bring something that needs a signature. Then I have panels pretty much beginning to end, so I will have almost no free time to just hang out.

Next year, with luck and they bring me back, folks will understand that my schedule is not under my control. And hopefully I’ll be doing less.

This year, I need to make them look good. And me.

And have fun.

But I gotta extrovert pretty damned hard for a week to do it.

Y’all ready for the ride?

The Stars of Science Fiction Humble Bundle!!!

Leave a reply

Wow. I’m in a Humblebundle with Brandon Sanderson, Frank Herbert(!), Alan Dean Foster, and Kevin J. Anderson. (And WAY more…)

Seriously.

It’s called the Stars of SciFi and it was put on by Draft2Digital to mark their new efforts in moving more directly into publishing, having largely been more of a middleman up until now. (They’re the folks that get my books into libraries. Have you checked out any of my stuff from your local library yet? You should.)

The Frank Herbert book, High-Opp, was apparently a lost novel, never before published and recently discovered by his son. I gotta get that one.

There is a metric crap-ton of stuff here, folks. Thirty-five possible titles, and only eleven of them look like single novels to a real quick eyeball. Instead, you have collections of novels or omnibus editions of things.

For me, the first Science Officer Omnibus, but I’m long past assuming that you’re read that if you’re here on my blog.

Fabulous Publisher Babe™ put out a new Darius Linard collection, the first time all of these stories have been put out in a single spine. Get it here!

Brandon Sanderson has the Shadows Beneath anthology.

Lindsay Buroker’s first three Fallen Empire books.

Two complete Alan Dean Foster collections plus the novel Oshenearth.

FRANK HERBERT NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED!!! (sorry)

Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Robert J Sawyer. Kevin J. Anderson. Dean Wesley Smith. Tao Wong. My bud G.S. Jennsen. Tami Veldura and Robert Jeschonek from the Boundary Shock Quarterly Syndicate.

Are you people listening here?????

Millions of words. $308 listed value, that you can get for as little as $25 (more would be nice because we’re supporting the Book First Charity:

First Book is a nonprofit social enterprise that provides new books and educational resources to programs and schools serving children in need. By making new, high-quality books and resources available on an ongoing basis, First Book is transforming the lives of children in need and elevating the quality of education. For more information, visit www.firstbook.org.

Over 30 million American kids live in poverty. First Book wants to see every single one of them read, learn and succeed. A nonprofit social enterprise, First Book makes new, high-quality books available to schools and programs serving children from low-income families. More than 120,000 educators and program leaders have joined First Book to access outstanding educational resources for free or deeply reduced prices. Together we can reach every child, every classroom and every community. Learn more about how you can support kids in need at www.firstbook.org.

So this is where I ask you to kick in some cash and get one hell of an amazing library of books you’ve never read, while doing something amazing to help more kids like you turn into avid readers of science fiction.

Limited time offer, as all Humblebundles are. Runs until the 24th, but you’ll want to jump on this now, and blow it through the roof.

And tell all your friends.

The Stars of Science Fiction Humble Bundle (and me)

The Power of Novellas

Leave a reply

A lot of folks seem to believe that you must either write short fiction, or novels in order to be successful.

The short game gets you into magazines and such, where you build up your name and polish your writing craft. I even know a few folks that do make a steady living on short stuff, mostly by turning around and selling all that short fiction as ebooks afterwards. (Lot of effort, but if it works, go for it.)

Downside is that $0.99 on Amazon nets you about 32c from a sale, so you have to move A LOT of units every day.

Flip-side of that are the folks that are convinced that only mega-doorstop novels (200,000 words+) on long series (Epic Fantasy comes to mind, but there are others) can be successful.

Today, I’d like to talk about the humble novella.

I published The Science Officer in December of 2014. And got struck by lightning in January, 2015. Dropped The Mind Field as fast as I could get it written, edited, and published, to take advantage of that incredible spike in sales that lasted about 100 days on the magic Amazon machine before it fell mostly back to earth.

After that, I wrote The Gilded Cage and I suddenly had a series on my hands. When I sat down and started the concept of following the Amazon Pulse, it was to write the next five books: The Pleasure Dome, The Doomsday Vault, The Last Flagship, The Hammerfield Gambit, and The Hammerfield Payoff, putting them up for pre-order spaced two months apart.

After that, I had enough material to go monthly (this would have been Fall, 2017)

Around that same period, I got struck by lightning a second time, in that the machines saw me dropping single genre, single series, back to back. It put me on the big advertising roundup. Plus I broke through somewhere with someone (to date, I have no idea who) blasting me all over the planet.

Put it this way, I was flying cross country in 2018 and got into a conversation with the woman next to me. Told her I was a writer and she was WAY interested, but turned out she didn’t like science fiction. Her husband was just across the aisle, so she handed him my Science Officer business card, because that was his gig.

He looks at it, smiles, and tells me that he liked the book.

Wait, you’ve already read it????

Cool.

To date, almost eight years later, The Science Officer remains my single best mover in terms of units. Every month, I release a new novel/project. Every month, Javier is my second or third best selling title in terms of movement.

Don’t make hardly anything, since it is up for $0.99, so we’re back to that 32c again. At the same time, my top twenty titles frequently contains ALL THE REST OF THE SERIES (book twelve coming in December. Y’all pre-ordered?) including the Omnibuses.

I literally make my living on Javier and the crew. Fortunately, I figured out what Season Two should look like, and am slowly working my way through that arc. Currently, they’ve been annual, but I might manage two per year for a bit, as I have a pretty good idea what the next story should be, plus the one after that.

From The Science Officer to The Hammerfield Payoff, those are all novellas. 24,000 words up to about 32,000. The Bryce Connection (#9) is actually a collection of four short stories that introduce four new sets of characters and runs about 24,000 words combined. From there: Alien Seas, Buried Among The Stars, and Captain Navarre are all novels, running 50,000-65,000 words, mostly because it gives me the space to write bigger stories.

But novellas are where it started, and you have to be to book ten to hit the first novel.

Past that, I have an erotica penname (Cole Braddock) that is currently writing a series that is (intentionally, consciously) a pastiche/homage to Star Trek (TOS and TNG for the most part). I have four of those done so far (Haunted Space, The Rift, Secrets, and Dreamer) that are all specifically targeted as novellas.

Finally, starting in January, I will publish a whole new space western series inspired by something I saw on tv, but radically altered because I wasn’t pleased with the choices the showrunners made. “I could have done that so much better” sort of thing.

Book One in the space western is 31,000, because I needed to introduce eight characters (not counting the ship, who is also important), a universe, technology, culture, and tell two separate story arcs in one spine. Book Two came in at about 18,000. Three through Six (so far) are all right around 22,000.

I learned to write screenplays under a mentor who was good at them (though we never got the money to make them. Anyone got $5m they want to invest? I have five that are all pretty damned good. Horror to Animated Kids Adventure.)

The software you should use is called Final Draft, because it handles all the formatting. (On Linux, I use a variant called Fade-In, which is almost as good, and have not yet paid for the full product, because I might not ever open it again. Different story.)

In a screenplay, one page of text is traditionally one minute of screen time, depending on dialogue. The timing rules are STRICT, so you have to hit 90-120 pages of screenplay. Period.

It also taught me how to write to length. And identify genre, sub-genre, and expected tropes up front.

An American one-hour drama on TV, with commercials, is about 38-40 minutes of show, plus opening and closing credits and 18-22 minutes of commercial breaks.

I wrote the Science Officer as a one-hour episode of a TV show. The Space Western and the Stephanie Machesky erotica are all targeted to that same length. The Space Western is even listed as Episode One, rather than Book One, because I want someone to make it into a TV show or animation, one of these days. (Options available cheap, serious inquiries only, expect contract redlining otherwise.)

Novellas. My goal is 20-24k each. And I’m greedy here. They’ll sell for $2.99 (for now, not counting inflation later) so people can get a good fix for not a lot of money. I’ll clear about $2.05 per unit at that rate, instead of $4 for a $5.99 novel, so I have to make up for it in volume.

I tend to write about 120,000 words per month, when I am on pace. (That comes down from time to time due to reasons.) If I write a pair of Space Western novellas, plus an erotica, that’s a good month’s work, and I’m not putting those out that fast, so I can write ahead and still keep the monthly pulse going. (Flip side is the second book in Kincaide’s War, which came in at 157,000 words, because that trilogy requires mass. Took me two months to write, with other projects slipped in as I went.)

For folks that many can only write 20,000 words per month (average 5,000/week, or 1,000/day with weekends off), you might consider writing a whole series of novellas, rather than spending a year writing a magnum opus doorstop. It will get you in front of fans faster and regularly. It likely makes you more cash, assuming the quality of your craft is high enough to draw the reader into a high read-through. (The Science Officer series has a read-through above 50% to book eight, for example.)

And it will force you to write tight, taut stories, because at 24,000 words, you do not have any time to side quest. In fact, 24,000 words might be a complete side quest loop in the longer arc of five or ten such novellas, but then you can make it entirely self-contained and hype up the energy to draw the reader in, instead of taking forever walking to Mordor. The Pleasure Dome literally set up the next four titles, with The Doomsday Vault and The Last Flagship being side quests to get to the Hammerfield duology (cliffhangered in the middle).

So you might look at your writing speed. Your commitments outside of writing, and what you could reasonably expect to produce in a year. Half of a 200,000 word doorstop, or 4-5 individual titles on that long arc, each making you money now? (And you can go back and collect them into a single spine later. Javier has Omnibus One and Two for those first eight.)

There are no rules anymore. If you publish it, folks will find it and read it. (Your craft and especially your luck will factor in, because I have been very lucky, but I was also poised to take advantage of that luck, both times it hit so far, as well as any future occurrences.)

YOU need to find that story length that makes you happy. I grew up on comic books, so incredibly long, serialized arcs are my wheelhouse, broken down into monthly, digestible lumps, with occasional cliffhangers. Comic books, ya know?

What will fill you with joy to write? How do you make your writing compelling? And anyone that tells you you can’t do something is either a fool or a foe.

I’m telling you that you have more options, and that you need to consider what you can do with them.

Because we’re all here to make money and have fun, aren’t we?

The Power of Breaking Streaks

Leave a reply

The power of breaking streaks has been on my mind. I quit the day job to become a full-time writer at the end of February, 2018 (No Pants Day, as we celebrate it around here). I had previously been tracking my writing as an annual thing, but in March and April I realized that I had greatly increased my writing speed and output, so I created a new spreadsheet to track. Ended up with just over 75k words for the month.

Pulp Speed One is only 83,334 words per month. One millions words per year. Pulp Two is 100,000/month. Hell, I can do this.

In May of 2018, I pushed a little, aided by a writing marathon. Ended up at 120k, or Pulp Speed Three. In the four years since, I have never fallen below 100,000 words, though there have been several times where I had to crush in in the last week to make that number. Usually February (short month) and August/September (busy season.)

This August, I’ll be going to Minneapolis for a week of family vacation, then doing CONvergence after that. I told them I was open to doing a lot of panels when I signed up. At most cons, that means I’ll get 4-6 over a 3-4 day weekend. They took me serious. Way serious. I have, between panels, signing, reading, and appearing on a podcast, sixteen things I’m doing from Thursday to Sunday. Like, all day, every day, basically.

I can do it. Have done it in the past. However, to do something like that, I turn on a mode called “Carnival Barker” which I’m pretty good at. However, he’s a mask. Not me at all. A bright, energetic, hyperactive lunatic.

Last time I did it was Rose City Comic Con in 2018. Ugly weekend.

Basically, I stop writing, because all my energy goes into performance instead. Different kind of creative.

Minneapolis will be no different, considering how much of each day I will be “On.”

Travel day out, plus four days of con, means I can expect to lose 20-25,000 words from my normal pace, plus however long it takes me to recover afterwards. (Taking a train home over two days, just to see the sights and do something Anti-Stodgy.)

With that in mind, I was talking to Fabulous Publisher Babe™ last night. Came to realize that I COULD do catch up afterwards, but that would drain me even more.

There’s this thing called a Streak. I’ve been on it for more than four years now. It threatens to take control, because we’re all competitive that way. I’m competing against myself, and nobody else, but it is still a competition.

I realized that I needed to come to grips with the streak breaking. Then I decided that I should simply break the streak entirely. Gone. Over. Start a new one for a while.

So instead of a cap of 120,000 words per month (all she’ll allow me), my cap in August will be 80,000. Yeah, I realize, still a shit ton of words compared to some folks. I also know people that put that out in a week and a half.

Stopping at 80 (and I do mean stopping, whichever day I hit that number, whichever paragraph, too) means I will not cross Pulp Speed One for the month. I think that I will still sustain Pulp Three for the year, as that’s 1.4 million words, and I’m currently about 50,000 above that, which I will offset by losing 40k here, which I can make up down the stretch.

If I want to.

Breaking the streak means that I don’t have to. I am currently about a year ahead on my publishing schedule (writing things now that will come out next summer/fall), with another year or so worth of Book Ones in the can where I need to write the rest of the series before I start publishing them.

Losing 40k here is not the end of the world, mostly because I’ve been really jamming on novellas this spring and summer. Ballpark 20k for a complete story as part of a much longer series arc, in a manner similar to the first eight Science Officer books (all 24-33k).

And I’m having fun writing. Short, medium, long. I have the second Kincaide’s War book done. Vehicles of Epiphany came in at 157k. (The Eden Package was 163k).

So I’m going to take something of a reverse vacation in August. Do other things, though I’m not sure what. Not write as much or as focused, which likely means that I’ll be backbraining a lot of weirdness.

That and maybe working with English Paul on a Punk Rock Opera. There’s always that.

But I’ll control the breaking of the streak, so it won’t weigh on me with the guilt. I’m a little sad ahead of time, but I’ll be over it and moving on by then. That’s good.

What kinds of streaks do you have, and should you consider breaking them now, so they don’t take over your life?