So Eagle and Broken Halo should be up soon. I'm thinking maybe Monday at the latest? We'll see.
In celebration of getting both books up this year despite my usual chaos-ridden life, I'm going to put Wolfhound, Badger and Iron Angels up for sale at $.99 until the end of the year. If anyone out there has been waiting for a discount to get into the series, now's the time! Also, the German edition of Wolfhound will be discounted until then as well. Happy holidays, and I hope you are all doing well.
Showing posts with label Wolfhound. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wolfhound. Show all posts
Saturday, December 21, 2013
Monday, February 18, 2013
On Background: Dark Energy
In honor of me finishing the rough draft of Eagle (cause I totally did!) I decided to take a stab at writing a bit about the background of the Jacob Hull universe. Mostly I'm a bit burnt out and unwilling to start on Airships before next week, so here goes.
One of the cool things about science is that the more we've discovered, the more we realize how little clue we have about how our universe works. Dark energy, along with dark matter, is one of those things that currently proves that maxim to its fullest.
There are a variety of explanations about dark energy, but what it boils down to (to my, non-expert understanding) is a collective "Huh?" on the part of modern astronomers. You see, the Big Bang theory (not that one) has managed to explain quite a lot about how the universe was formed. We've discovered background radiation from that first initial explosion, and all the galaxies in the universe are speeding away from each other, just as that theory would predict. There's just one problem.
They are all speeding up.
Why is that a problem, you ask? Well, according to a little thing we call gravity, we know that all matter is drawn toward other matter at a certain rate. That rate is lessened by distance and depends on the mass of the objects involved, but the gist of it is that the mass in the universe should be attracting the rest of the mass in the universe--especially those big globs of stars and planets we call galaxies. The initial assumption was that--due to gravitational pull--all those galaxies would eventually slow down and reverse course, finally merging together in a big condensed clump for another Big Bang of some sort. That is not what is happening at all.
They figured that out by looking at the light coming in from those galaxies, and measuring what kind of light it was. Light coming from an object headed toward you has blue shift, thanks to the Doppler effect. Light coming from an object headed away has redshift, thanks to that same effect. People have measured the light from the various galaxies and have found that they have redshifts--and that the shift is increasing. Basically, they did to galaxies what traffic cops do to your car and found that not only were they speeding, they were freaking flooring it.
Now, the concept they are using to explain the phenomena is called dark energy. Basically, from what I can understand of the subject (which I admit is limited) is that they think it is either the energy cost that is paid by the universe's expansion to have more empty space, or that there must be a kind of energy called a quintessence field that provides the gravitic acceleration. There is apparently a high-level debate on what those theories imply, and we aren't anywhere close to figuring out which one is correct, but they have concluded that dark energy makes up about seventy-three percent of the energy and mass in the universe. That's right, we have no idea about the nature of about three quarters of existence.
So how does this relate to Jacob Hull? When I was writing Wolfhound, I was reading about dark energy and came across a description of it as a sort of 'negative pressure' in the universe. With the weird way that my mind works, I connected negative pressure with the air pressure systems on Earth which create winds. From there I jumped to the idea of a similar sort of wind system occuring between concentrations of high and low 'negative pressure' in space, which people could sail along using sails meant to catch the energy provided by those dark energy currents. From there I went to the Capistans capturing that energy like specialized windmills, and missiles and torpedoes using those same currents to accelerate as well.
Now I'm sure there are at least a couple of physicists who are crying out in horror at what I've just done to the whole concept of dark energy. I'm sure there are already plenty of theorems and explanations to describe why the direction I went with here is absurd and illogical. I'm fine with that; Wolfhound was never meant to be a science textbook after all, and I readily admit that it was not meant to be hard sci fi either. Still, there was the thought process behind the background, for those who are interested. Hope to be a bit more regular in posting here in the future. See you around!
One of the cool things about science is that the more we've discovered, the more we realize how little clue we have about how our universe works. Dark energy, along with dark matter, is one of those things that currently proves that maxim to its fullest.
There are a variety of explanations about dark energy, but what it boils down to (to my, non-expert understanding) is a collective "Huh?" on the part of modern astronomers. You see, the Big Bang theory (not that one) has managed to explain quite a lot about how the universe was formed. We've discovered background radiation from that first initial explosion, and all the galaxies in the universe are speeding away from each other, just as that theory would predict. There's just one problem.
They are all speeding up.
Why is that a problem, you ask? Well, according to a little thing we call gravity, we know that all matter is drawn toward other matter at a certain rate. That rate is lessened by distance and depends on the mass of the objects involved, but the gist of it is that the mass in the universe should be attracting the rest of the mass in the universe--especially those big globs of stars and planets we call galaxies. The initial assumption was that--due to gravitational pull--all those galaxies would eventually slow down and reverse course, finally merging together in a big condensed clump for another Big Bang of some sort. That is not what is happening at all.
They figured that out by looking at the light coming in from those galaxies, and measuring what kind of light it was. Light coming from an object headed toward you has blue shift, thanks to the Doppler effect. Light coming from an object headed away has redshift, thanks to that same effect. People have measured the light from the various galaxies and have found that they have redshifts--and that the shift is increasing. Basically, they did to galaxies what traffic cops do to your car and found that not only were they speeding, they were freaking flooring it.
Now, the concept they are using to explain the phenomena is called dark energy. Basically, from what I can understand of the subject (which I admit is limited) is that they think it is either the energy cost that is paid by the universe's expansion to have more empty space, or that there must be a kind of energy called a quintessence field that provides the gravitic acceleration. There is apparently a high-level debate on what those theories imply, and we aren't anywhere close to figuring out which one is correct, but they have concluded that dark energy makes up about seventy-three percent of the energy and mass in the universe. That's right, we have no idea about the nature of about three quarters of existence.
So how does this relate to Jacob Hull? When I was writing Wolfhound, I was reading about dark energy and came across a description of it as a sort of 'negative pressure' in the universe. With the weird way that my mind works, I connected negative pressure with the air pressure systems on Earth which create winds. From there I jumped to the idea of a similar sort of wind system occuring between concentrations of high and low 'negative pressure' in space, which people could sail along using sails meant to catch the energy provided by those dark energy currents. From there I went to the Capistans capturing that energy like specialized windmills, and missiles and torpedoes using those same currents to accelerate as well.
Now I'm sure there are at least a couple of physicists who are crying out in horror at what I've just done to the whole concept of dark energy. I'm sure there are already plenty of theorems and explanations to describe why the direction I went with here is absurd and illogical. I'm fine with that; Wolfhound was never meant to be a science textbook after all, and I readily admit that it was not meant to be hard sci fi either. Still, there was the thought process behind the background, for those who are interested. Hope to be a bit more regular in posting here in the future. See you around!
Saturday, April 28, 2012
On Cool Stuff and Getting Stuff Done
Alright, so first things first. Iron Angels second to last draft is finally done. Yeah! Now it is off to our esteemed copy editor, Tristi Pinkston. Hopefully that means we will be on track for a publication date in May, which at the moment looks increasingly likely.That also means that I am now free to work on other projects again, namely The Social Contract's first draft and the Badger rewrite. I will hopefully have the alpha readers go over Badger during May, so that I can then spend most of June tearing it apart. Let me know if you want to help out with the whole process! As it is, Badger has a target publication month of August, and I think we have a very good chance of making that date too. After that, the only other book to get done during 2012 will be the sequel for Kingsley, subtitled Murders in Whitechapel, which hopefully will be ready by November.
Five books in less than a year. That's possible and not entirely crazy, right? Aheh heh...
On to other things. We have a cover being done for Badger at the moment, again by Paul Hamblin, our awesome artist from Wolfhound. He's sent me a few rough versions, and says he'll have the finished prodcut done soon. I'll post it when it's ready, so get excited for it!
We've also had an ad up occasionally on Girl Genius, and things have been going moderately well for us. I don't know how cost effective ads are for ebooks; perhaps it is the fact that we need people to buy the book and not just visit a comic? At the same time, Kingsley's been doing a bit better as a result, so I'm not complaining at all!
Also, at the end of this next week, Emily and I will be off to Utah to participate in the LDS Storymakers conference. It will be the first time going as an actual professional writer, so I'm kind of nervous. At the same time, we'll get to meet some of our writing friends and attend some cool panels and workshops, so it is totally worth it!
Finally, whoever did this is awesome, hands down. I'm on a freaking wiki! Huzzah!
Whew, lots of news, huh? Perhaps I should post here more often... oh well. Off to work! See you around!
Saturday, January 14, 2012
On A Turning Point
So, Wolfhound has been doing pretty well lately.
To be honest, that's kind of an understatement. December was about twice as profitable as we had expected, and as of right now, we've already passed the dancing-in-the-street threshold for January. We've gotten six different reviews from people with really positive comments, which is always encouraging, and made it pretty solidly onto three of Amazon's bestseller list categories which will probably help us continue to sell. Plus, we've even managed to put together the Smashwords version of the book! The one thing we haven't been able to deal with has been advertising--I've been so busy trying to keep my writing schedule that ads and stuff have taken kind of a low priority over writing itself--but I guess that can be expected when I've got a full time job to worry about and a family to help. Hopefully at a future date I can make the whole ad thing work, but for now we are doing good!
I suppose that in a lot of ways we've now reached a turning point because as of now, Wolfhound has repaid our initial investment in the book. The copy edit and everything else is now paid for. Anything we make from here on forward is pure profit. On top of that, we've managed not to just rest on our laurels. We're now about to publish a second book, which might possibly grow just as fast as the first one did, which means that in a couple of months they might be both paid back. We've become profitable as a small business! I didn't expect to reach that point until next year. It's incredible.
Of course, this means we're going to have to adjust our expectations going forward. My standards of success have been kind of inflated, and I'm wondering if that means I'm going to face a few disappointments later on. Still, it will be worth it to see this opportunity go forward. What's life without a little risk, right?
I just want to thank you guys for all of your support. It's been a great ride so far, and it's only going to get better from here! See you around.
To be honest, that's kind of an understatement. December was about twice as profitable as we had expected, and as of right now, we've already passed the dancing-in-the-street threshold for January. We've gotten six different reviews from people with really positive comments, which is always encouraging, and made it pretty solidly onto three of Amazon's bestseller list categories which will probably help us continue to sell. Plus, we've even managed to put together the Smashwords version of the book! The one thing we haven't been able to deal with has been advertising--I've been so busy trying to keep my writing schedule that ads and stuff have taken kind of a low priority over writing itself--but I guess that can be expected when I've got a full time job to worry about and a family to help. Hopefully at a future date I can make the whole ad thing work, but for now we are doing good!
I suppose that in a lot of ways we've now reached a turning point because as of now, Wolfhound has repaid our initial investment in the book. The copy edit and everything else is now paid for. Anything we make from here on forward is pure profit. On top of that, we've managed not to just rest on our laurels. We're now about to publish a second book, which might possibly grow just as fast as the first one did, which means that in a couple of months they might be both paid back. We've become profitable as a small business! I didn't expect to reach that point until next year. It's incredible.
Of course, this means we're going to have to adjust our expectations going forward. My standards of success have been kind of inflated, and I'm wondering if that means I'm going to face a few disappointments later on. Still, it will be worth it to see this opportunity go forward. What's life without a little risk, right?
I just want to thank you guys for all of your support. It's been a great ride so far, and it's only going to get better from here! See you around.
Monday, January 9, 2012
On Keeping Perspective
So the book thing is really moving forward! We're kind of shocked at how well Wolfhound seems to be doing, and we've already gotten two more positive reviews. It's been great seeing what people have enjoyed about the story, and I'm kind of looking forward to that kind of feedback in the future. Something I could get used to! :)
We've even been selling a few copies of Killer as well. For those who don't remember, Killer is the short story I wrote and entered in the Mayhew Short Story Contest at BYU. It did pretty well there, but it hasn't sold a lot on Amazon while it's been up. I guess some of Wolfhound's success is pulling it along though, which is kind of fun. We'll have to see what happens with both of them once Kingsley's first book goes up!
While that's been going on, I've been readjusting to going back to work in the ER, getting far too little sleep, and frantically trying to juggle writing projects. Between writing the Kingsley extras, writing the new material for Social Contract, getting ready to do the final revisions on Kingsley and a bunch of other stuff, I'm going kinda crazy. The fact that I keep obsessively checking Amazon to see if I'm failing yet doesn't help. :P
At the same time, I've needed some help to keep things in perspective. Luckily the other day I got to take my daughter on a walk. We just wandered around the bike paths near our apartment and visited a local park for a while. It was lot of fun to watch her experience the world; just grabbing a leaf and playing with it was like a wonder to her. Seeing the world through her eyes and being able to enjoy those little moments reminded me of simple and straightforward life can be, and how important it is to just sit back and take a breath of fresh air. Otherwise we get lost in the mess of things, and that's no good for anyone, least of all us.
So that's my rambling report for the moment. Hope all is going well for you guys! See you around
We've even been selling a few copies of Killer as well. For those who don't remember, Killer is the short story I wrote and entered in the Mayhew Short Story Contest at BYU. It did pretty well there, but it hasn't sold a lot on Amazon while it's been up. I guess some of Wolfhound's success is pulling it along though, which is kind of fun. We'll have to see what happens with both of them once Kingsley's first book goes up!
While that's been going on, I've been readjusting to going back to work in the ER, getting far too little sleep, and frantically trying to juggle writing projects. Between writing the Kingsley extras, writing the new material for Social Contract, getting ready to do the final revisions on Kingsley and a bunch of other stuff, I'm going kinda crazy. The fact that I keep obsessively checking Amazon to see if I'm failing yet doesn't help. :P
At the same time, I've needed some help to keep things in perspective. Luckily the other day I got to take my daughter on a walk. We just wandered around the bike paths near our apartment and visited a local park for a while. It was lot of fun to watch her experience the world; just grabbing a leaf and playing with it was like a wonder to her. Seeing the world through her eyes and being able to enjoy those little moments reminded me of simple and straightforward life can be, and how important it is to just sit back and take a breath of fresh air. Otherwise we get lost in the mess of things, and that's no good for anyone, least of all us.
So that's my rambling report for the moment. Hope all is going well for you guys! See you around
Friday, January 6, 2012
On the Roller Coaster
My book has been selling really well! In fact, we're doing well enough that it's kind of inspired a paranoia level paradox in me. Am I just building my hopes up to be brought down hard later on? Will a bunch of the new readers decide it sucks now and one-star review me? Maybe it's all just a government conspiracy meant to lull me into complacence? (You can tell I've been writing cyberpunk, huh?) I am excited and uncertain and jumping up and down over this success in something I've dreamed of forever. It's kind of like a dog actually catching a car they've been chasing for years. What do I do with it now?
On the other end, somebody found a typo. Left an extra word in that needed to be removed. Crud. At least it is only one in like 120k words right? I just need to change that up.
Also, had a wonderful interview today that should be going up on the 20th. I will post the link when it does. Look forward to it.
I've been able to start work on the bonus material for Kingsley, and I am enjoying it immensely. For those not in the loop, I've decided that people who buy the hardback and paperback versions of Kingsley will get an extra little bonus at the back of the book, mostly as a reward for buying the more expensive version. My wife has been reading it over my shoulder and I've won a few appreciative head scratches, so it should work out well!
Also, I've been plugging away at Social Contract. Somehow all the success that Wolfhound is enjoying has put a lot of pressure on me to not screw up the new book. That stress is relatively frustrating at this point, because every first draft has giant gaping holes in it that need to be resolved. I should be worrying more about how to set up the setting and lay groundwork for the future character development, but then the realization that people are going to expect a good story out of me now intrudes. Grg.
Yeah, you can see how chaotic things have been. My own private little roller coaster. So far it is turning out to be a fun ride though, so I can't complain. Hope everyone is doing alright out there, and as always, thank you for your support. See you around!
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
On Bleh
You never realize exactly how much you are on the internet until your modem dies and you suddenly don't have the internet to be on. :(
Fortunately we were able to fix that problem fairly quickly, which is why I once again have a steady, glorious connection to the interwebs. All the better to obsessively check on Amazon with.
Speaking of which, we got another review! And it was another good one! Sales for Wolfhound are still going fairly well; I've been impressed with how the book is doing, and I've come to the conclusion that December and January are golden times for a new book. If things keep going like this, then Wolfhound will have paid itself back easily. That sort of early success definitely does wonders for my self confidence.
Of course, now the more neurotic half of my brain is chipping away at that confidence by making me worry that I will let these people down with my next book. All of a sudden I have expectations to live up to, and that was an unexpected burst of stress to deal with. At least Iron Angels is now out, Social Contract has been started (Mwahahaha!) and I have a few days to pound away at Edawku before I dig into the Hector Kingsley copy edit. No pressure though. Right?
Right?
Fortunately we were able to fix that problem fairly quickly, which is why I once again have a steady, glorious connection to the interwebs. All the better to obsessively check on Amazon with.
Speaking of which, we got another review! And it was another good one! Sales for Wolfhound are still going fairly well; I've been impressed with how the book is doing, and I've come to the conclusion that December and January are golden times for a new book. If things keep going like this, then Wolfhound will have paid itself back easily. That sort of early success definitely does wonders for my self confidence.
Of course, now the more neurotic half of my brain is chipping away at that confidence by making me worry that I will let these people down with my next book. All of a sudden I have expectations to live up to, and that was an unexpected burst of stress to deal with. At least Iron Angels is now out, Social Contract has been started (Mwahahaha!) and I have a few days to pound away at Edawku before I dig into the Hector Kingsley copy edit. No pressure though. Right?
Right?
Monday, January 2, 2012
On A Good Start
So here we are in 2012. Has the apocalypse started yet?
Wolfhound has been out for almost a full month, and I have to say we've been doing pretty well! The book has officially hit the "good job" mark and kept going strong, though I don't think I will post actual sale numbers here. Pride goeth before the fall and all that. :) We've also got a review up, which was pretty positive and very encouraging. I had been getting a little worried as to why we hadn't got any before then, but I guess people were just taking some time to get through it. I just want to meet those expectations in the sequel!
Iron Angels is pretty near the completion of the next draft, with a bunch of helpful alpha readers set up. That's always nice to have, especially since I suspect the schedule for that book is going to be cutting it a little close. My goal is to have it ready by tomorrow and out to the readers as soon as my fingers can hit the keys. Wish me luck!
The final copy edit of The True Adventures of Hector Kingsley has been delievered! That means that my next project, outside of doing an alpha read, will be to revise that book and get it ready for publication in early February. I'm getting both excited and nervous about it, but I think it will do at least as well as Wolfhound, if not better!
In any case, I suppose I should get back to work, shouldn't I? Hope all is going well for everyone, and I will see you later!
Wolfhound has been out for almost a full month, and I have to say we've been doing pretty well! The book has officially hit the "good job" mark and kept going strong, though I don't think I will post actual sale numbers here. Pride goeth before the fall and all that. :) We've also got a review up, which was pretty positive and very encouraging. I had been getting a little worried as to why we hadn't got any before then, but I guess people were just taking some time to get through it. I just want to meet those expectations in the sequel!
Iron Angels is pretty near the completion of the next draft, with a bunch of helpful alpha readers set up. That's always nice to have, especially since I suspect the schedule for that book is going to be cutting it a little close. My goal is to have it ready by tomorrow and out to the readers as soon as my fingers can hit the keys. Wish me luck!
The final copy edit of The True Adventures of Hector Kingsley has been delievered! That means that my next project, outside of doing an alpha read, will be to revise that book and get it ready for publication in early February. I'm getting both excited and nervous about it, but I think it will do at least as well as Wolfhound, if not better!
In any case, I suppose I should get back to work, shouldn't I? Hope all is going well for everyone, and I will see you later!
Monday, December 19, 2011
On The Measure of Success
One of the things that can be hard about self publishing is how you measure your own success. This problem seems especially present at the beginning, since you never know how much of your books are being bought by family and friends (yeah, that means you Mom) and how many are being bought by new customers. Not only that but there is nobody outside of yourself that can really evaluate your numbers for you. There's no boss, publisher, or accountant looking at your sales and saying "Alright, this isn't working so let's do something different" or "Wow, we're doing pretty good, keep up the pace!" The only current judge of my success is myself, and that is unusual for someone who has spent his life passing other people's tests or trying to meet other people's business goals. The only similar situation has been when I was on my mission and had to set my goals for each week. It's crazy to think that I have that kind of freedom again, only now in a far different field of work.
So I think I will set some benchmarks for Wolfhound's success, just so that I can have them recorded here. That way I can try to adapt and change things if needed. Hopefully we will just sell thousands and thousands based off of my sheer, recognizable writing genius, but my brilliance cannot always carry the day, can it? :)
So, as a benchmark, we have set a minimum, scraping the bottom of the barrel goal of five books sold a month. If that's all that is happening, we are still moving forward, but we should probably look into changing marketing strategies or something in order to increase sales.
Fifty sales in a month are more like an okay number. Not bad, not good, but pretty much average in terms of our expectations. Wolfhound is my first book, after all, and we are hoping that we can sell at least that much until Kingsley goes up in February. It's a bit of an ambitious goal, but it would set us up with a decent base to launch from.
Anything over that would be awe-inspiring. One hundred in a month would make us happy, two fifty would have me dancing in the streets. Dreams to shoot for, but probably not going to happen unless things really take off--or at least until I get multiple books up and start in on the sequels.
So yeah, those are my benchmarks, if anyone was curious. As of now Wolfhound is currently edging towards "okay" territory, and blissfully staying out of "scraping" levels. We are already surpassing the hopes we had for December, and I'm taking that as a good sign of things to come. Thanks for sticking with us and for all of your support. See you around!
So I think I will set some benchmarks for Wolfhound's success, just so that I can have them recorded here. That way I can try to adapt and change things if needed. Hopefully we will just sell thousands and thousands based off of my sheer, recognizable writing genius, but my brilliance cannot always carry the day, can it? :)
So, as a benchmark, we have set a minimum, scraping the bottom of the barrel goal of five books sold a month. If that's all that is happening, we are still moving forward, but we should probably look into changing marketing strategies or something in order to increase sales.
Fifty sales in a month are more like an okay number. Not bad, not good, but pretty much average in terms of our expectations. Wolfhound is my first book, after all, and we are hoping that we can sell at least that much until Kingsley goes up in February. It's a bit of an ambitious goal, but it would set us up with a decent base to launch from.
Anything over that would be awe-inspiring. One hundred in a month would make us happy, two fifty would have me dancing in the streets. Dreams to shoot for, but probably not going to happen unless things really take off--or at least until I get multiple books up and start in on the sequels.
So yeah, those are my benchmarks, if anyone was curious. As of now Wolfhound is currently edging towards "okay" territory, and blissfully staying out of "scraping" levels. We are already surpassing the hopes we had for December, and I'm taking that as a good sign of things to come. Thanks for sticking with us and for all of your support. See you around!
Friday, December 16, 2011
On Hardcovers and Kingsley's Cover
So we have progress! The hardcover version of Wolfhound is now up on Lulu. It is selling for quite a bit more than the electronic version, but I've always thought that was worth it for a physical copy of a good book. And it is a good book, so... :)
In any case, we are going to try and get paperbacks up on Lulu and maybe Createspace this weekend, so stay tuned for that. We are going somewhere! Huzzah!
In other news, we have a cover for the first Hector Kingsley novel. It was created by the distinguished Mr. Robert Ennis. I think it looks awesome, and has only made me more excited for February to roll around so the book can go up. Until then, I'll see you around!
In any case, we are going to try and get paperbacks up on Lulu and maybe Createspace this weekend, so stay tuned for that. We are going somewhere! Huzzah!
In other news, we have a cover for the first Hector Kingsley novel. It was created by the distinguished Mr. Robert Ennis. I think it looks awesome, and has only made me more excited for February to roll around so the book can go up. Until then, I'll see you around!
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
On Being Published+Guest Post with Joe
Well, it is finally dawning on me that I have a book up where people can buy and read it. It is a weird feeling.
I guess part of it is the fact that I've worked so hard on that novel, and now there is nothing left to do. It's done, all over but the formatting. By the end of the week we hope to have the paperback and hardcover versions more or less adjusted and squared away, and after that point I will never have to edit Wolfhound ever again. That alone is a strange, unfamiliar feeling.
That's not even including the social aspect of the thing. I occasionally mention the book to my coworkers, half of whom don't seem to have remembered or realized what I was doing with the whole writing thing. Their reactions range from surprised to indifferent, but at the very least they tend to wonder what in the world I am doing with my life. When I try to explain about how pubishing has changed these days and what my writing plan is for the next few months, I get a few polite nods and maybe a glazed look. I think actually publishing something has forced me to realize exactly how much technical jargon I've absorbed over the past year of working on this thing.
Perhaps the strangest thing is that I actually know what I'm doing for the next year. Kingsley will probably be out by February, if everything goes to plan, and Iron Angels won't be too much longer after that. Good crappity, Badger is planned as coming out in six to eight months unless I totally drop the ball. And after that I have other books planned out stretching out all the way to December 2013; the main question about the whole thing is how I will find enough time to revise everything.
So yeah, I suddenly have a career outside of the emergency room. And it's awesome and strange and I'm not quite used to it yet. But thanks to everyone who has already bought the book (and thanks for the patience of the people waiting for the hardcover!), and I hope I don't let you all down, despite my failings. Also, go check out the guest post I did on Joe's blog! It talks about space pirates. Can't go wrong there! See you around!
I guess part of it is the fact that I've worked so hard on that novel, and now there is nothing left to do. It's done, all over but the formatting. By the end of the week we hope to have the paperback and hardcover versions more or less adjusted and squared away, and after that point I will never have to edit Wolfhound ever again. That alone is a strange, unfamiliar feeling.
That's not even including the social aspect of the thing. I occasionally mention the book to my coworkers, half of whom don't seem to have remembered or realized what I was doing with the whole writing thing. Their reactions range from surprised to indifferent, but at the very least they tend to wonder what in the world I am doing with my life. When I try to explain about how pubishing has changed these days and what my writing plan is for the next few months, I get a few polite nods and maybe a glazed look. I think actually publishing something has forced me to realize exactly how much technical jargon I've absorbed over the past year of working on this thing.
Perhaps the strangest thing is that I actually know what I'm doing for the next year. Kingsley will probably be out by February, if everything goes to plan, and Iron Angels won't be too much longer after that. Good crappity, Badger is planned as coming out in six to eight months unless I totally drop the ball. And after that I have other books planned out stretching out all the way to December 2013; the main question about the whole thing is how I will find enough time to revise everything.
So yeah, I suddenly have a career outside of the emergency room. And it's awesome and strange and I'm not quite used to it yet. But thanks to everyone who has already bought the book (and thanks for the patience of the people waiting for the hardcover!), and I hope I don't let you all down, despite my failings. Also, go check out the guest post I did on Joe's blog! It talks about space pirates. Can't go wrong there! See you around!
Friday, December 9, 2011
On It's Done!
It's up! Huzzah! Wolfhound is now up as an Amazon ebook. That alone is kind of nerve wracking, but I feel like I've done my best with it. As a first book and a start to my publishing career, I could hope for nothing better.
And of course, it has railguns, pirates and explosions in it. What more could you ask for? :)
So I will be putting the link to Amazon on the Links and Samples page. Links to the hardcover and paperback copies will be up as quickly as we can get them active (paper covers are so much harder!), so if you want to hold out for the non-ebook copy, keep checking back! Thanks to everybody for your support, and I will hopefully be on a more sane schedule soon. See ya!
And of course, it has railguns, pirates and explosions in it. What more could you ask for? :)
So I will be putting the link to Amazon on the Links and Samples page. Links to the hardcover and paperback copies will be up as quickly as we can get them active (paper covers are so much harder!), so if you want to hold out for the non-ebook copy, keep checking back! Thanks to everybody for your support, and I will hopefully be on a more sane schedule soon. See ya!
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
On The Final Readthrough
Getting to the end here, and once I'm done the book will start being put in by tomorrow morning. Almost there...
I'm happy to report that I like the book. I like it enough that I laugh at the characters and look forward to a lot of the scenes. That's a good sign right? Can you tell I'm nervous about this? Just a little?
I'm happy to report that I like the book. I like it enough that I laugh at the characters and look forward to a lot of the scenes. That's a good sign right? Can you tell I'm nervous about this? Just a little?
Monday, November 28, 2011
On the Finish Line
So, another cross country related post. Hope it all makes sense.
I've done a previous post on a portion of my cross country course. As I mentioned then, our coach had taken great pains to provide a challenge to us and to our competitors. At one point, I heard that he had measured out the entire five kilometer (three and some odd miles for you non-cross country people) course to make sure that it was exactly one third up hill, one third down hill and one third flat.
Running the course could easily help you believe that rumor. There were several hills, each providing its own challenge and given its own unique name. There was Starter (pretty obvious reasons there), Ice Cream (sweet, sweet downhill), JV (cause its playin with ya) Sandy Hill (also obvious), and Mother (Cause it's not playing with you. At all). Each had its own way of confronting you with difficulty and forcing you to tough it out until you got to the top. By the time you got down off of those hills and onto the nice, flat bike path leading back to the finish, you were grateful they were all done.
What you didn't realize, of course, was the fact that all of those hills had been packed into about two thirds of the course. By the time you got down to the path, you still had a full 1200 meters left to go, nearly a full mile. If you sprinted the moment your feet hit the path, you were destined to die long before the finish.
The other thing you have to remember is where our coach put the finish line. He designed the course to loop back through a central area, where spectators could sit and watch the runners go by. You passed through that spot three different times after the start, and the finish line was set up right there. That means everyone is sitting there, waiting and cheering for you for the entire length of that last grueling flat section.
Those of you who run, especially in competition, know that cheering spectators are like crack for a runner. It's addictive; you want so badly to run harder and faster when people are shouting for you. It's an incredible boost, and one that I appreciated many times during my track and cross country days.
I did not appreciate it for the first thousand or so yards of runnning down that path, trying so hard not to sprint too early because I knew I wouldn't make it to the end. In a phrase, it sucked.
It was not an easy temptation to resist. After all, at the end of the race, you really, more than anything, just want it to be done. You want to stop running, cause it hurts. You want to get some water, maybe get your breath back, probably puke if it's been a really bad day. Mostly you want to finish hard, run well, and have the rewards of all the hard work you put in. Coach found a way to test us mentally with that last little trick of his, and I'm glad to say it taught me a lot that I need to know right now.
I say that because as of now, I'm on the last little bike path with Wolfhound. I have all the chapters for the book, I need only to go and look through some of the copy edits, format it and put it up online. There is an incredble urge just to put in a couple of 4am nights and have done with it, because it has been a really long race.
At the same time, I feel that is the worst thing I could do. I could get the book up, sure, but I would miss some of the final, refining touches that need to be made to it in order to make the story really shine. Putting those touches in means that I will no longer get the book up by the end of this Monday. It may mean that I will have to delay it until December 10th or so, which was the original deadline for the book before I started to advertise it around. Yet in spite of how frustrating that is to me, I believe that Wolfhound--not to mention my mental and physical health--will be better off in the long run for doing it.
So yeah, if you've noticed that the book isn't quite up yet, do not worry, it will be soon. I just haven't reached the sprinting point yet, and I hope that you will all have patience with me until I do. See you around!
Picture of the bike path courtesy of http://www.simsburyskirt.com/2010/08/stratton-brook-state-park.html. Yes, that was where the finish line was in the distance there. Yes, you could hear the spectators the whole way. And yes, Coach Cohen is a mad genius whose course terrified the other teams. He was awesome.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
On Progressing as a Writer
So I was thinking about it today and I have come to a decision. I think I am a better writer today than I was a year ago.
I know that must sound like a really obvious statement, but you have to look at this in perspective. When you are progressing as a writer it typically comes along very slowly. Your projects often take several weeks at a time, and it takes several weeks more to get most kinds of feedback on it. Often, aside from your own opinions on the subject, you don't have a lot of benchmarks to measure yourself by. It can seem like you are just running on a treadmill in terms of your skill, running and running until you wonder if you will ever have a chance to improve. That and there is this creeping fear that it is just as easy to lose your skill as it is to gain it, and that it could have happened to you.
Fortunately, I don't think that has happened to me. Wolfhound, is my first publishable quality novel. I've made it pretty much as good as it will be, and I feel confident that Jacob Hull will do a very good job of leading the way for my other stories to follow. Kingsley and Iron Angels both came afterward, and I can confidently say that the level of skill I've shown in those books is higher than Wolfhound, which given how good that first book is, really says something. Of course, they are also different types of books, so I could imagine that I was just finding a better kind of story to tell. The tipping point, I would have to say, was Badger, the sequel to Wolfhound. It's the same kind of story that Wolfhound was, though perhaps a bit less heavily structured, but it's just plain better. The characters stand out more, the plot is more balanced and understandable, and is all around a better story. I've gotten better!
I think I have had quite a few advantages that have helped me do that. My writing group has been a big part of that. The advice, suggestions and reactions of my fellow writers in that group have helped me to tweak my own writing style and grow as an author. The fact that I have been working flat out for about a full year on four different stories has helped me continue to improve--I didn't need to remember things that I'd learned with a previous project, because there hadn't been any downtime where I would have forgotten it. Finally, I've kind of had the desperation and determination provided by the fact that in a very short time I was going to have to start selling these things. That kind of need to produce things in order to publish on time breeds plenty of motivation to get better in the craft.
So yeah, I've gotten better at writing. Here's hoping that I can continue that progress as Wolfhound and my other stories start coming up over the next year. We shall have to see!
Thursday, November 17, 2011
On eBook Fomatting
I will never, for the rest of my life, indent a paragraph using the Tab button for as long as I live.
Also, I will not spell names in two different ways over the length of an entire novel.
That is all.
Monday, November 14, 2011
On Samples!
So hey! I've managed to get sample chapters of Wolfhound up on my blog and over on the Wandering Leaf Publishing blog. Check it out for the beginning of the novel I'm putting up for sale in a couple of weeks. On this blog, it'll be under the Links and Samples page, along with the back cover description for the book. Hope you enjoy it!
On another note, AHHHHH! We're almost publishing something!
On another note, AHHHHH! We're almost publishing something!
Friday, November 11, 2011
Another Interview Up+On Early Christmas Commercials
So I've got another interview up, this time at Michele Ashman Belle's blog. I think it turned out pretty well, so go take a look.
So the other day I was watching TV during my lunch break--a luxury of working in the emergency room I suppose--and I found myself confronted by an age old enemy of mine. No, not the political ranting which now somehow occupies two thirds of any given preelection year. No, not people who hate videogames, or label nerds as an enemy of society. No, not even the spectre of bad sitcoms or repetitive drama shows disturbed my evening meal. It was a far older enemy that has haunted me more each coming year.
I speak, of course, of the pre-Thanksgiving Christmas commercial.
It may be that my feelings on this subject are tainted by the bias I picked up living in Massachusetts and Connecticut. There, Thanksgiving is a holiday you actually celebrate and everything, rather than a temporary gluttonous pause before launching into the shopping furor we know as Christmas. I like Thanksgiving. I like the memories I have from childhood of pumpkin pie and going over what I'm grateful for in my life. I think it is a tradition our society dearly needs to preserve. Yet each year it falls more and more by the wayside as Christmas tries to swallow November whole--having already polished off December of course.
The worst part about it is that it only gets worse from here. Holiday shows start taking the place of regular episodes, often just recycled stuff from the eighties. Songs I rarely want to hear before mid-December start repeating on the radios (is anyone else disturbed that we haven't had a new Christmas song since like the fifties?) and doesn't stop until they've squeezed every last drop of Holiday cheer out of it. The whole thing has gotten so overblown that it all begins to feel hollow.
This scourge has grown worse with the passing of time. I have not even had the opportunity to enjoy my traditional turkey and Pilgrim imagery, and I already have a bunch of idiots prancing to Christmas carols and telling me to buy something. My dear wife might consider me something of a Grinch when it comes to disliking these things. Maybe she's right, but it won't stop me from crying out indignantly when It's the Most Wonderful Time, to Buy Stuff gets butchered by another commercial in early November. Because trust me, at this point, somebody needs to.
Aaannnnd that's my curmudgeonly rant quota for the month. Happy Holidays!
So the other day I was watching TV during my lunch break--a luxury of working in the emergency room I suppose--and I found myself confronted by an age old enemy of mine. No, not the political ranting which now somehow occupies two thirds of any given preelection year. No, not people who hate videogames, or label nerds as an enemy of society. No, not even the spectre of bad sitcoms or repetitive drama shows disturbed my evening meal. It was a far older enemy that has haunted me more each coming year.
I speak, of course, of the pre-Thanksgiving Christmas commercial.
It may be that my feelings on this subject are tainted by the bias I picked up living in Massachusetts and Connecticut. There, Thanksgiving is a holiday you actually celebrate and everything, rather than a temporary gluttonous pause before launching into the shopping furor we know as Christmas. I like Thanksgiving. I like the memories I have from childhood of pumpkin pie and going over what I'm grateful for in my life. I think it is a tradition our society dearly needs to preserve. Yet each year it falls more and more by the wayside as Christmas tries to swallow November whole--having already polished off December of course.
The worst part about it is that it only gets worse from here. Holiday shows start taking the place of regular episodes, often just recycled stuff from the eighties. Songs I rarely want to hear before mid-December start repeating on the radios (is anyone else disturbed that we haven't had a new Christmas song since like the fifties?) and doesn't stop until they've squeezed every last drop of Holiday cheer out of it. The whole thing has gotten so overblown that it all begins to feel hollow.
This scourge has grown worse with the passing of time. I have not even had the opportunity to enjoy my traditional turkey and Pilgrim imagery, and I already have a bunch of idiots prancing to Christmas carols and telling me to buy something. My dear wife might consider me something of a Grinch when it comes to disliking these things. Maybe she's right, but it won't stop me from crying out indignantly when It's the Most Wonderful Time, to Buy Stuff gets butchered by another commercial in early November. Because trust me, at this point, somebody needs to.
Aaannnnd that's my curmudgeonly rant quota for the month. Happy Holidays!
Monday, November 7, 2011
On Getting Through November + Interview at A Storybook World
Alright! So it's been a busy last couple of weeks. We are officially about three weeks out from putting Wolfhound online, and that fact has me a little intimdated, excited, befuddled and happy. It's kind of a mix of things. In one way I feel like it's taking forever to get up, because I've been working on publishing this thing for months now. At the same time, it's like this deadline is rushing straight at me way, way too fast. So I'm now enjoying the delightful blend of impatience and panic that I would assume accompanies the publication of anyone's first book. I guess that means I've hit the perfect middle ground then right?
Progress on Mysteries continues apace. I'm at about the halfway point, which is more or less where I had wanted to be by now. Based on the status of other projects, however, I think that I will need to prolong the number of weeks I work on this one. It is not that the novel is taking too long--far from it in fact--I just need more time to revise other projects so that they are ready for the next step in the process. Among those projects would be a 3.2 draft of Iron Angels to get it ready for an alpha read (would have already been ready with 3.1, but then I got an excellent character development idea), work on getting a copy editor/cover artist team together for the True Adventures of Hector Kingsley, a 2.1 draft for Badger (Emily really liked it! Huzzah!)and finally the formatting and prep work to put Wolfhound up on the 28th. I figure that those projects are important enough to extend the schedule a little bit for Hector's second novel, especially if it means that I get the next few books up online in a shorter amount of time.
So yeah, that's the progress so far! I just need to make it through this month without going completely nuts and we will have finally gotten this book up! Now it's just a matter of following through...
On another note, I have another interview up, at A Storybook World. Go there and read it! See you around.
Progress on Mysteries continues apace. I'm at about the halfway point, which is more or less where I had wanted to be by now. Based on the status of other projects, however, I think that I will need to prolong the number of weeks I work on this one. It is not that the novel is taking too long--far from it in fact--I just need more time to revise other projects so that they are ready for the next step in the process. Among those projects would be a 3.2 draft of Iron Angels to get it ready for an alpha read (would have already been ready with 3.1, but then I got an excellent character development idea), work on getting a copy editor/cover artist team together for the True Adventures of Hector Kingsley, a 2.1 draft for Badger (Emily really liked it! Huzzah!)and finally the formatting and prep work to put Wolfhound up on the 28th. I figure that those projects are important enough to extend the schedule a little bit for Hector's second novel, especially if it means that I get the next few books up online in a shorter amount of time.
So yeah, that's the progress so far! I just need to make it through this month without going completely nuts and we will have finally gotten this book up! Now it's just a matter of following through...
On another note, I have another interview up, at A Storybook World. Go there and read it! See you around.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
On One Month Until Publication
So as of yesterday, I have about thirty one days until my first book goes up for sale, and I find out if other people like the story as much as I do.
...
AHHHHH!
All futile panicking aside, I am really, really excited about this whole thing. It is an incredible opportunity to put my work out there and to have the help of so many people to get this thing done. We have had a wonderful cover artist, an impressively dedicated copy editor, and friends willing to both give advice and help refine our efforts. I've been amazed at the amount of help and friendship we've recieved, and in case I haven't remembered to do so before, I just want to thank all of you for being there when we needed you.
Now we just need to get the edit done and format everything for release. Also, now that I think about it, if we mean to get Kingsley up in four months, we need to look for another batch of cover art and copy editing. Along with Mysteries and Iron Angels, that should be more than enough to keep me busy. Like I needed help with that before, right? See ya!
...
AHHHHH!
All futile panicking aside, I am really, really excited about this whole thing. It is an incredible opportunity to put my work out there and to have the help of so many people to get this thing done. We have had a wonderful cover artist, an impressively dedicated copy editor, and friends willing to both give advice and help refine our efforts. I've been amazed at the amount of help and friendship we've recieved, and in case I haven't remembered to do so before, I just want to thank all of you for being there when we needed you.
Now we just need to get the edit done and format everything for release. Also, now that I think about it, if we mean to get Kingsley up in four months, we need to look for another batch of cover art and copy editing. Along with Mysteries and Iron Angels, that should be more than enough to keep me busy. Like I needed help with that before, right? See ya!
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