Category: Genesis Earth Trilogy

Arrrgh Smashwords!

So I go to upload “From the Ice Incarnate” to Smashwords as a free give away, and this is what I see. Arrgh!  Why do I have to wait??  Why can’t my book be up nowww…?

Okay, seriously, it’s not that big of a deal.  I’ll just have to wait until tomorrow to start spamming everyone sharing it.  And unlike last week, I’m going to be more open about the fact that I’m giving this story away for free.

I decided last week to put up “Decision LZ1527” and “Memoirs of a Snowflake” for free on Smashwords, mostly to see if I could get Amazon to price match.  So far it hasn’t worked, but it has given me some very interesting insight into the minds of ebook buyers.

The results aren’t scientific, of course, but so far it’s confirmed what I’ve heard elsewhere: that there’s a HUGE difference between people willing to pay more than $1 for an ebook, and people who will grab anything because it’s free.  So far, 62 people have downloaded “Decision LZ1527,” 33 people have downloaded “Memoirs of a Snowflake,” but only 2 people this week downloaded the free sample of Genesis Earth–and no one has bought a copy.

Of course, this is only after one week.  Perhaps the people who downloaded the free stories are just taking a long time to read them.  Perhaps they just can’t afford to buy many ebooks right now, but because they read and enjoyed my stories, they’ll check it out when they have more time/money.  Maybe some of them will run across my ebooks years later and remember “oh hey, that’s the guy with that crazy sci fi dating story” and check me out then.  Or maybe they’re all cheapskates who only read stuff they can get for free.  I don’t know.

But I don’t think it’s the last one.  A friend from my apartment complex walked up to me today and told me he’d read and enjoyed my story.  It was pretty cool.  That’s what I’m really after at this point: exposure and readers.  So I think it’s a good idea to give at least some stuff away for free, even if it doesn’t push people to buy your other books in the short term.

Speaking of which, I’ve tried out something else new: raising the price of Genesis Earth from $2.99 to $3.85.  Why in the heck would I do that?  Mostly because of value perception; I want people to know that I have confidence that my book is worth at least #3.85, that I believe they’ll feel it was worth what they paid for.  The kind of books I want to write are the kind that people will want to read twice, and I want to see if changing the price to reflect that will build the kind of readership that is looking for that sort of thing.

I might be totally wrong, of course, but hey it’s worth a shot.  I’ve sold two copies so far this month, so at least it hasn’t totally killed sales.  I’ll probably keep it at that price for at least a couple of weeks, just to see what happens.

But I can tell you one thing I don’t think I’ll ever do: price a novel higher than $5.  I’ve always thought that $6.99 and $7.99 for a paperback is a little steep, even if the book completely changes my life.  That’s not something you can put a dollar value on, and even if you could, why would you want to charge that much?  If your book was so deep and meaningful, wouldn’t you want to give it away for free?

So yeah, I’m trying to suck my readers dry, only to find a business model that works.  And if you think $3.85 is too steep, please let me know.  I’d like to give my books away for free, but at the same time, I want to eat without spending my life as a wage slave.

In the meantime, if you haven’t already, check out my free stories!

Civilized internet trolling and things to look out for

The Genesis Earth blog tour rolls on; just recently, I did an interview with Cindy Borgne of Dreamer’s Perch.  She’s been showcasing a number of other indie writers on her site, and the interviews are quite interesting, so check it out!

Also, Moses Siregar is up to an interesting new project called Indie Author Rockstar.  I’m not sure exactly how it will work, but it’s basically a community book blog / monthly book contest.  Genesis Earth will be participating in that, so be sure to check it out once it goes live (and also check out the site’s twitter feed)!

Finally, I got embroiled in a somewhat heated discussion with Howard Tayler on the comment thread of the latest Writing Excuses podcast.  The question we circled around was: “is traditional publishing still safe?” I’m not totally sure what ‘safe’ means in this context, since writing has never been truly ‘safe,’ but it was an interesting if somewhat exasperating discussion. 

Fortunately, it ended well, meaning that I didn’t get banned (though I think Howard was contemplating it). I don’t think either of us ‘won,’ but several onlookers came away feeling enlightened–and most of them agreed that the discussion was generally polite. So if I’m a troll, at least I’m a civilized one. If that’s even possible.

So that’s what’s going on here.  Genesis Earth is still selling at a slow but steady pace, and the revision of Desert Stars is going very, very well.  This is going to be such an AWESOME book–I can’t wait until I’ve got it up for you guys to check it out!

In parting, let me leave you with this amazing trance song I discovered while working data entry. That’s one of the advantages of doing boring computer work all day–it frees you in some ways to do other things. Enjoy!

…WHUT

So this morning when I was getting ready for church, I realized that I couldn’t find my Kindle.  Anywhere.  Remembering that I’d left it at a Quark event in my apartment’s lobby, I started frantically calling people and knocking doors.  Unfortunately, no one had seen it.

A few hours later, after combing every place I could have possibly left it at least four or five times, I have to admit it’s completely lost.  I have a very good idea when and where I lost it, so the only remaining possibility is that someone picked it up.  The aggravating thing is waiting to see whether they return it, or whether they decide to run off with it.  ARRRRGH!

The amazing thing is how attached I’ve become to that device in the last month since I first got it.  I’m not a particularly voracious reader, but right up until I lost it I was carrying that thing around everywhere.  It’s so amazingly convenient–instead of lugging books around, I can read almost anything I want on a device that fits in my back pocket.  And the interconnectivity is really cool, too, although if I end up having to replace it, I’ll probably go with the more expensive 3g version, since hunting for wireless is a major pain.

But yeah…it’s lost, and I can’t currently afford to replace it.  I’m saving up for Worldcon 2011, so finances are tight; I’ll probably have to work this temp job through most of August just to be able to go.

However, all is not lost.  Yesterday, Genesis Earth got a stunning review on a book blogger / fellow indie writer’s blog.  My favorite part:

This is space opera of the highest caliber.  There are grand, sweeping ideas, the discovery of a new world, first contact with an alien species, an examination of the nature of humanity, the nature of the human mind.  Yet it’s always a personal story.  No matter how epic the backdrop, you are always reading about engaging, fully-realized characters.

It certainly qualifies as an adventure story, and keeps you wondering what will happen next.  Yet it’s also much more.  Genesis Earth will broaden your mind even as it delights your inner ten-year-old.  It has a kick-ass premise, executed with enviable skill, full of thought-provoking ideas couched in a thoroughly-entertaining story that’s just plain fun to read.

I kid you not, I stood up and did a little dance when I read that.  Someday, I’ll probably have a wife who will secretly videotape a moment like that and embarrass me by posting it to youtube or something…hehe.  Anyhow, the whole review is awesome, so check it out!

In other news, I finally got around to publishing Genesis Earth on the Nook: you can find it here.  And I don’t know whether I mentioned this or not, but I’ve also published it to smashwords, so if you live outside the US/UK and want to avoid the nasty $2+ surcharge that Amazon tags onto its international sales, you can find it there.

As far as the epublishing goals I set at the beginning of the week, I’ve accomplished all of them except the blog tour index and the 3+ guest posts…better get on top of that.  This week, here is what I want to accomplish:

  • Publish the short stories to smashwords for $0 and get Amazon to price match (since giving them out for free will *hopefully* drive readers to my novels).
  • Figure out how how the Kindle book forums work.
  • Query artists/illustrators for Bringing Stella Home cover art.
  • Send out Genesis Earth to another 5 review sites.
  • Write another 3 guest posts for the Genesis Earth blog tour.
  • Put up the index for the blog tour.

Oh, and one more thing…FIND MY &$%! KINDLE!!!

<< sigh >>

Another publication in Leading Edge!

That’s right!  My poem “Zarmina,” dedicated to Gliese 581 g (the first exoplanet discovered in its sun’s habitable zone) is published on page 98 of issue 61 of Leading Edge!

Also included in this issue is an excellent essay by Brandon Sanderson, in which he introduces his second law of magic systems.  It’s an excellent essay, and has made me rethink how I do FTL systems, especially for the Gaia Nova universe.  I’ll have to do a post a little later on that.

Besides this landmark essay by Brandon Sanderson, this issue features stories by Dan Wells and Dave Farland, as well as an interview with Howard Tayler.  And as always, it includes a number of excellent stories and illustrations.  Check it out!

(Full disclosure, I volunteer as a slushpile reader and occasional copy editor for the magazine.  However, my work always goes through the submission process under a pen name, where only the head editor knows who I am until the decision on whether to acquire the story has been made.)

In other news, Genesis Earth is now up on Goodreads, so go check that out as well!  The nice thing about Goodreads is that you can give the book a # star rating without having to write out anything else.  If you’re so inclined, I would very much appreciate an honest review–but if you do give it a rating, please be honest.  Don’t worry; even if you give me less than five stars, I won’t hunt you down like this crazy author (hint: get some popcorn and read the comments).

So anyhow, that’s what’s been going on here.  Desert Stars is coming along slowly but surely, and I’m working on getting some cover art for Bringing Stella Home.  If you have any ideas or suggestions on the art, please let me know.  I’ll probably go through my back issues of Leading Edge to search out good sf artists.  For some reason, I’m having a hard time finding anything that clicks on deviantart.  My goal is to epublish that book by the end of July.

I need a productivity boost

Yeah…today wasn’t that great.  I revised through about 2k words in Desert Stars, but none of it was new material, and I only worked on it for maybe 3 cumulative hours.  I’m working full time now, but even so, I can do better than this.

My self-imposed deadline for Desert Stars is July 9th.  That needs I need to do three chapters per week, and last week, I only did two.  Some of the later chapters are going to require tossing out everything and starting from scratch, but for the next four or five, I probably just need to shuffle scenes around without changing too much.  Hopefully, I can get through three this week, perhaps even four.

Genesis Earth continues to do well, though.  I checked it at work, and saw that 69% of the people who view the Amazon page end up buying the book.  That’s huge.  Some glitches over the weekend have made sales updates sporadic, but it’s still selling a good 1.5 copies per day.  So to all of you who have bought a copy: thanks so much!

There’s still a lot I need to do for Genesis Earth on the epublishing front, however.  Here’s my to do list for this week:

  • Send GE to +5 review sites.
  • Publish GE to the nook.
  • Get GE listed on Goodreads.
  • Do 3 guest posts / interviews for the blog tour.
  • Create an index for the blog tour.

Should be pretty straightforward…if I can balance writing time with non-writing publishing/promotion time (along with full time job time).  It’s going to be tricky, but I think I can do it.

Here’s my plan: I’ll get up at 6:30 each morning and write for at least half an hour, exercise, get ready for work, etc.  When I get  home at 5:30, I’ll eat a quick dinner and then devote myself to writing until about 7:30 (I have events going on every weekday evening that start at 7:30).  In the late night, I’ll maybe write a little, but that won’t be my primary writing time (since I never get much done when it is).

So anyways, that’s my tentative plan for this week.  Hopefully, that productivity boost will kick in soon, and I’ll be writing 3.5k words a day again.

In unrelated news, Adventures in Sci Fi Publishing posted an awesome interview of Kristine Katherine Rusch up on their podcast yesterday.  To all my writing friends: you really should check it out and listen to it.  Kris is an amazing veteran professional in the sf&f field, and has loads of good advice.  I read her blog religiously and recommend that all other aspiring writers do the same.

Which reminds me: Robin Sullivan was interviewed last week on another podcast, and this one is also very much worth checking out.  Robin runs a small press called Ridan, which is embracing unorthodox business practices and doing surprisingly well in today’s publishing climate.  I’ve said that I’m on hiatus from seeking a publishing house for the next three years…but if I could get into Ridan, I would in a heartbeat.

Finally, let me end this post with a cool trance song I discovered the other day.  Way mellow, with sweet vocals that fit surprisingly well with my current WIP.

The blog tour rolls on

I’m writing this post from Leading Edge (the internet is down at my apartment), so I don’t have much time, but I did want to take care of a few items of housekeeping.

First, my next guest post in the Genesis Earth blog tour is up, this one at Charles Millhouse’s blog.  Charles is a fellow sf writer whom I met on the Kindleboards, and the post basically explains my writing routine since last year.  Of course, since I’ve technically been unemployed since graduation, my routine is a little wacky, but I think you’ll find the post interesting. Check it out!

Desert Stars is coming along.  I took yesterday off to finish drafting the revision notes, but I’ve still got the last three chapters to go.  It’s going to be awesome, though–I’ve got so many ideas for how to improve the story.  Many thanks to all my first readers for your feedback!  It’s been immensely helpful.

Also, I decided to take down “From the Ice Incarnate” from Amazon.  I still think it’s a good story, but I don’t want someone to buy Genesis Earth, love it, then buy the story and feel ripped off.  Also, I think I might have more luck with my short stories if I send them out to print markets instead.  I’ve submitted “Decision LZ1527” to Escape Pod; if it sells, hopefully that will drive readers to my ebooks.

And on that note, if you’ve read Genesis Earth and enjoyed it, I would like to ask you to please post a review on Amazon.  I don’t want to be one of those guys who secretly boosts his stats by coercing people to write fake reviews, but if you did enjoy the novel, I would appreciate it a ton if you would take the time and share your experience.  At this point in my career, that’s probably the thing that would help me out the most.

So anyways, that’s what’s going on here.  Hopefully, the internet will be back before the weekend.  See you around!

First Radio interview and other such stuff

Dude, check it out–my first radio interview just went live on the Dungeon Crawler’s Radio website!

I met these guys at CONduit last month, where they had a booth and were recording all sorts of authors and artist.  They were way cool when I talked with them, and when they found out I was a writer invited me on!

Hehe, considering how many big name authors they have on their show, I think I totally bombed–but it was still awesome.  The guys who run the show were really great, too; it was a ton of fun hanging out with them.  So thanks, guys, for having me on!

In other news, I just uploaded Genesis Earth to Smashwords, and I think it’s already live.  So for all those of you who want to get it from somewhere other than Amazon, it’s now available!  I’m still working through all the formatting kinks, so if you buy it and find some errors, let me know and I’ll send you a fixed copy.

Also, the cool thing about Smashwords is that you can generate coupon codes and even give the book away for free.  What I’m hoping to do is print up a few business cards with the code for a free book, then distribute them at conventions like Worldcon.  Hehe, imagine walking up to an editor and being like “hey, want my book?  Here you go!” Or even just dropping off a stack at the freebies table; I think it could be an awesome way to get exposure.

Man, there’s so much exciting stuff going on!  This is a great time to be a writer.

On the writing front, I’m making excellent progress on my current WIP (work in progress), Desert Stars. I’ve read through all the feedback from my first readers, and have a ton of fantastic ideas for how to make this story really shine.  I revised through about 2.1k words this morning before work, and I’m hoping to do at least two and a half chapters before this weekend.

Also, a couple days ago at work, I was trawling through tvtropes (one of the advantages of doing data entry is that you can afford to feed the addiction, hehe), and I had a SUPER awesome idea for the next book in the Gaia Nova series.

Since Bringing Stella Home is basically the Mongol conquests set in space, the big story to conclude that arc would be the battle of Ayn Jalut, where the Mongols suffered their first decisive defeat.  I did a little bit of setup for that in Into the Nebulous Deep, with the remnants of the Gaian Empire gathering at New Rigel.

Well, here’s what I’m thinking: I’ll bring back Danica’s team of mercenaries from Bringing Stella Home, make Roman a viewpoint character, and have Rina from Desert Stars join up with them as a quiet little girl in black who seems painfully shy, but is actually a deadly effective assassin whose weapon of choice is a bowcaster.

Oh yeah, I think this has some crazy awesome potential.

In any case, I should probably get to bed so I can get up early and write tomorrow. I hope to finish Desert Stars 3.0 by July 10th, and even though it’s going to take a lot of work, I think I can make it happen.

And after that…well, things just keep getting more and more awesome. I love writing!

Ebook update

As many of you know, I epublished my first novel two weeks ago, and three short stories a few months before that.  How has it been going?

First, let me point out that I have another guest post out as part of the Genesis Earth blog tour, this one on my friend Gamila’s blog.  Gamila reviews YA and LDS fiction, and is a big proponent of clean reads.  For my post, I wrote about the place of LDS writers in science fiction and fantasy and the unique things we have to offer these genres.  Fun stuff; you should check it out.

So now that that’s out of the way, how do the numbers look for my epublishing venture?  Not bad, actually.  In two weeks, I’ve sold twenty copies of Genesis Earth and gotten two five star reviews on Amazon, only one of which was from someone I know.  Not bad–I’m looking to get at least $50 from Amazon come September, which should be very nice.

The short stories have not sold nearly as well, however.  Part of it probably has to do with the fact that I’m not a super stellar short story writer, but another part probably has to do with the lack of promotion.  The review of “From the Ice Incarnate” by Red Adept Reviews did lead to a few extra sales for all my stories, but only about half a dozen or so.  Nothing spectacular.

Part of it also has to do with the sampling system, I think.  With ebooks, you can download a free sample (usually the first 10% of the text) and decide whether you want to buy it or not.  For Genesis Earth, that amounts to the first three chapters and then some; for the short stories, maybe a couple of paragraphs and that’s it.

So what’s the takeaway?  I think that novels work out much better as ebooks than short stories.  For one, you can justify charging more for them (I haven’t seen anyone selling short stories for more than $.99), and thus get the higher royalty rate. For another, they work much better with the sampling system; readers are much more likely to get hooked on the first 10% of a novel than the first 10% of a short story.  And lastly, I’d say that you need to figure out some kind of way to promote yourself and get your work out there.  Still working on that.

All in all, not too bad.  But here’s the really cool part (and I mean really cool): at my current cost of living, I estimate that I need to sell only 15 ebooks per day to break even financially.  At a consistent average of 25 books per day, I could justify quitting my “day job” (150% of all monthly expenses).

How is that exciting?  Well, get this: starting out the gate with very little platform or exposure, I’m averaging a little over 1 ebook sale per day.  If I could boost that up to 3 sales per day for 5 books, I’d be breaking even.  At 5 sales per day for 5 $2.99 books (~800 total ebook sales per month), I’ll be making a living.

See why I’m excited?

My goal now is to get up to 5 full length novels / novellas out before the end of the year.  Believe it or not, that’s very achievable.

First, I’ll be epublishing Bringing Stella Home sometime this summer, hopefully in time for worldcon.  Shortly thereafter, I hope to publish Sholplan as a $.99 novella.

My current WIP is the third draft of Desert Stars, and I bet I can have that ready before Christmas.  While I’ll put the whole thing out as its own novel, I like Emma’s idea of splitting it into two books as well.  I’ll probably title them Dome and Desert and Sand and Stars, and make the first one available for free just to get more exposure.

And at some point in between all that, I’ll finish compiling all my travel journals from the 2008 BYU Jordan study abroad and put that out as its own work.  That one should be fun, and a good way to experiment with in-text photos and illustrations.

That’s my plan.  The more I put my work out there, the better my chances at making it big.  And even if I don’t, if I have enough titles out and they all sell more or less consistently, I can still leverage that to make a full-time living.  And that’s my dream.

So yeah, I’m extremely excited.

New title and writing update

Just a quick update before I go to bed.

After much deliberation, I decided to go with Desert Stars as a title.  Thanks, Megan, for suggesting it.  It’s a little short, and doesn’t exactly wow me, but I’ll try it out and see if I grow into it.  The most important thing anyway is what the readers think.

The last couple of days have been going slow, mostly because of stupid writerly avoidance things.  It’s a lot easier for me to revise than it is to write new material, and the last couple of chapters have required a lot of new material.  But I think I’m through most of it, and will hopefully make some good progress tomorrow.

Genesis Earth has been selling a lot better than I thought it would…which doesn’t say much, but at least it says something.  For promotion, all I’ve done is the blog tour, a couple links on facebook, and general participation on the Kindle Boards.  In any case, I’m betting that writing is more important than promotion, so that’s where I’m focusing my energy.

The temp job I’m working is pretty good.  I listen to stories, writing podcasts, and lectures all day while doing data entry.  One of the most interesting ones is this presentation from Gencon, all about story structure and the hero’s journey.  Good stuff; it’s helped me figure out a lot of things with my current WIP (Desert Stars).

I’ve also been listening to a lot of trance music, especially Armin Van Buuren.  I know my Dad will think it’s crap, but hey I like it!  I think I’ll leave you with this track, where Armin teams up with the guy behind Owl City.  I’d tell you how many times I’ve listened to it, but that would be embarrassing.  So anyways…good night!

Genesis Earth is now live!

That’s right!  Genesis Earth, my first epublished novel, is now available on Amazon for $2.99.  Check it out, post a review, tell your friends!

I decided to price it at $2.99 for a few reasons:

First, that’s the lowest price at which Amazon allows a 70% royalty rate.  When you buy the book, I get $2.05, which is a very nice royalty even for a traditionally published book.  A lot of readers like to know that their money is going to support the author, rather than the people exploiting the author, and that’s only really possible at this price point.  I might drop the price to $.99 at some point in the future, but only for a short period of time for a special promotion.

Second, there’s the question of value perception.  I don’t want people to think that my book is worth less than a cheeseburger at McDonalds.  Sure, I might get more buyers if I price it lower, but I don’t want to attract people who will buy it and never read it; I want to attract people who will read it, love it, and buy all my other stuff–and I plan to put out a lot more work before the end of the year!

Third, and perhaps most importantly, I fully believe that this book is worth that much.  It’s worth at least that much.  Granted, if I didn’t have to worry about money, I’d gladly give it away for free (and what an awesome world that would be!), but even so, if you’re a person who enjoys thoughtful, character driven science fiction, I’m confident that you’ll come away from Genesis Earth feeling satisfied.

So yeah, Genesis Earth is finally up!  Buy it, read it, blog it, tweet it, facebook link it, start format…er, yeah, you get the picture.  Wheee!!

I’m going to start guest blogging on a bunch of other blogs, but don’t worry, I’ll keep this blog updated as well.  I also need to get back into writing my next novel, so I’d better do that now.  See you around!