No writing on Sunday. I generally don’t write on Sundays, so I didn’t bother giving a progress update either. That’s another reason why I’m shooting for 2,000 words a day through nanowrimo, instead of the more typically 1,667.
Making really good progress on “In the Wake of Zedekiah Wight,” which will probably turn into a short novella after all. Had to do some plot noodling, but I think I’ve got the rest of it figured out. Since it’s a short story (or at least, since it started as a short story), I didn’t bother writing an outline, which meant that I had to spend more time thinking the story out today than actually writing it.
Making progress on Children of the Starry Sea too. The next scene is going to be a lot of fun: it’s a family dinner with Jeremiah and Noemi from Star Wanderers (and all their kids, of course), except as a guest they have Reva from Sons of the Starfarers. The scene is from Reva’s point of view, and if you’ve read that series through to the end, you’ll understand why that would be fun to write.
It’s getting late and we should have gone to bed an hour ago, so I’ll end this for now. Shooting for 3k words tomorrow.
Today is day two, and I’m making very good progress so far. I’ve found that it really helps to keep my daily word count goal if I have two projects to work on: my main WIP, which is usually a novel, and a side project like a short story. When I run out of steam on the main WIP, I can switch to the other project and usually crank out a few hundred words to round out the day.
This author’s note originally appeared in the August 15th edition of my author newsletter. To sign up for my newsletter, click here.
It was not an easy decision to enroll all of my Star Wanderers books into Kindle Unlimited. For years, this was my flagship series, not only on Amazon but on all platforms. Enrolling it in KU means that the ebooks are only available on Amazon now, and the first book is no longer free to non-KU subscribers.
In the indie author community, KU has always been a controversial program. It all boils down to one word: exclusivity. In order to enroll your books in KU, you cannot publish them anywhere else but Amazon. The upshot is that Amazon’s algorithms give your books a huge signal boost—about 2.5x, by my back-of-the-envelope calculations. Getting writers to do anything is a bit like herding cats, but with the right incentive structure you can do it. Amazon wants to be the dominant retailer for ebooks, and KU is their tool for doing it.
I don’t blame readers for subscribing to KU. It seems like a great program: $9.99 per month gives you an awesome selection of books to choose from. And certainly, Amazon can do what it wants on its own platform. If that means reducing the visiblity of books that aren’t exclusive to your platform, so be it. But as a matter of principle, I believe that exclusivity is bad for readers and writers, which is why I’ve stayed out of the program.
Until now. What changed? A few things. Earlier this year, I finally wrote out a complete business plan that describes everything I do (72 pages, 22.2k words). That made me rethink a lot of things, especially my marketing strategy. If Amazon gives books in KU such a huge signal boost, could I use that to bring more readers to my books that aren’t in KU? If none of my books are enrolled in KU, isn’t that just another way of making my books exclusive?
When Kindle Unlimited launched in 2014, I had finally reached a point where I could live off of my book royalties. A lot of that was because of Star Wanderers: with a permafree first-in-series, it got a lot of visiblity. But then, the Amazon algorithms changed to favor KU over permafree. I chose to stay out of KU, and lost more than 60% of my writing income over the next 18 months as a result.
I learned several things from that experience. First, I learned that I couldn’t rely on Amazon to do my marketing for me. I had to come up with a plan. Second, I learned that it was a bad idea to be dependent on just one platform. It was time to diversify.
Paradoxically, this meant doubling down on my decision to keep my books out of KU. But it paid off. In 2014, more than 90% of my writing income came from Amazon. Now, it’s more like 40%-60%, depending on the month. If I had panicked and put all my books in KU, I wouldn’t have those other income streams right now, and many of those readers never would have found me.
Over the years, I also became less dependent on Star Wanderers as well. I began to move toward writing trilogies of longer books instead of longer series of shorter books. And as I wrote and published more books, interest in my Star Wanderers books seemed to wane.
So now I’m in a place where enrolling Star Wanderers into KU actually makes sense. I have a plan and a marketing strategy, I’m not dependent on Amazon anymore, and the books themselves seem well-suited to the experiment. We’ll see how it turns out.
If you’re not an Amazon customer, don’t worry: I’m not going to enroll all of my books in KU, and still plan to release all of my new books wide. For now, it’s just Star Wanderers. And if you are a KU subscriber, I hope you enjoy! These books have a very special place in my heart, and I’m happy to share them with you.
It’s been a busy, busy month. I finished a major WIP, published a new bundle, started a new job at the local bookstore, and made a bunch of changes and adjustments behind the scenes. And that’s just my writing life!
Nothing Found
First, I published a new Star Wanderers bundle, containing the complete series. This replacesThe Jeremiah Chronicles and Tales of the Far Outworlds, the two previous series bundles that have been up for the last several years.
Eventually, I plan to release Star Wanderers: The Complete Series as an audiobook. That’s one of my big projects for the year. I want to narrate it myself, but I also want to do a damn good job of it, which means I have to learn how to properly record and produce a quality audiobook. That’s going to take time.
I will probably release Star Wanderers: The Complete Series in print too, once I’ve gotten set up for that. As I mentioned in my last post, I’ve pulled all my books from KDP Paperback and plan to go with a different print-on-demand publisher in the not too distant future. But again, that’s going to take time to do properly.
Second, I finished Gunslinger to Earth! At this point, I’m just waiting to send it out to my editor. Another few weeks, and it will finally be up for preorder!
There’s a lot of stuff happening behind the scenes, too. I’ve sent out more than 60 short story submissions this month, sold one to The New Accelerator, and hope to sell a lot more in the next few months.
I’ve also been rethinking my email newsletter. Until now, I’ve been using it mostly just to share free and 99¢ stories, and tons of links to giveaways. But now, I think that might not be the best way to provide value.
From what I can tell, there are basically two approaches to newsletters: as a vehicle to convert casual readers into fans, or as something much more personal to keep the existing fanbase active and motivated. Obviously, there is some overlap.
With the way I’ve structured things, I lean a lot more to the first approach. However, I do think there’s a lot more that I can share to add value, even to casual readers. Here are some things I’m thinking about sharing:
More detailed updates about my writing, current WIPs, and what I’ve been up to.
Recommendations of other books that I’ve read and reviewed. To do this properly, I plan to set up a separate book site.
Extended descriptions and background information about my books, kind of like what I’ve got in the author’s notes, but with links and detailed by series.
Stories from my personal life tha readers might find interesting, such as experiences from working in a bookstore.
Better curation of the group promos that I participate in. Until now, my approach has basically been to spam InstaFreebie / Prolific Works, but I think it will be better to participate in a smaller number of group promos that more closely match the kind of books that I write.
I still plan to do free and 99¢ book deals, but not necessarily with every email. A book deal is still more of a take (“read my book!”) than a genuine give.
Those are a few of my current ideas. Do you have any of your own? If so, I would very much like to hear about it!
The other big change to my newsletter is that I’m branching out to other sites, like Story Origin, Book Cave, and Bookfunnel, to build my email list. I’ll probably also add preview editions of my books to Prolific Works and put more emphasis on those. It’s something to experiment with.
Still trying to figure out how this blog fits in to everything else. At this point, I’m just doing my best to keep it updated. I have lots of ideas for blog posts, but not a whole lot of time to write them.
There’s a ton of books that I’m reading or want to read, and at some point I really need to revamp my Goodreads profile and get all of my book reviews up there. Probably after I set up the new book site, which will mostly just be a repository of affiliate links for all of the books that I review. I can’t put them up on this site without commingling them with my own books, and I don’t want to do that.
That’s most of the big stuff, at least for now. The main focus for the next couple of months will be growing my email list and figuring out my newsletter. My girlfriend is a programmer, so this weekend we’ll fix up the newsletter template I’ve been using and hopefully make it cleaner. If you have any other ideas for that, please share!
After some deliberation, I’ve decided to unpublish the two omnibus bundles for my Star Wanderers series: The Jeremiah Chronicles and Tales of the Far Outworlds.
In place of the omnibus editions, I plan to release Star Wanderers: The Complete Series on all platforms. Currently, it’s only available on Kobo. Eventually, I’ll put it out in print as well, but until then the omnibus print editions will still be up. All of the singles are still available in print and ebook, and will be for the foreseeable future.
When I wrote the Star Wanderers series back in 2011–2014, it was, in many ways, an experiment. Instead of writing one long book with four or five viewpoint characters, I decided to write eight shorter books, where each one focused on one character’s story and told it in greater depth. The first four books were all from Jeremiah’s point of view, hence The Jeremiah Chronicles. The other four were each from a different character’s viewpoint, with two viewpoint characters in the last one. Since I already had one bundle, I decided to put them all into a second one. Hence, Tales of the Far Outworlds.
Going forward, though, I don’t think it makes much sense to break up the series this way. Better to have one series bundle with all the books (and the short story “Starchild”), so that they’re all in one place. I don’t have plans to add anything new to this series in the near future, though that may change. If it does, though, it will be its own new thing.
The other advantage to combining all the books into one complete series bundle is that it makes it easier to put the whole thing out in audio. One of the things I want to do this year is produce an audiobook, and I think that Star Wanderers will do better as a single, longer audiobook that costs one or two credits than as eight short books that cost one credit each. But that’s still somewhere in the mid-future.
It’s the end of an era for me, but I think it’s for the best. Star Wanderers: The Complete Series will be available on all ebookstores later this month.
Is it time for another update? Why yes, I suppose it is.
Sons of the Starfarers is coming along quite well. Book 6, Patriots in Retreat, is up for preorder right now with a release date of January 19th. My editor just got back with the edits for book 7, A Queen in Hiding. Haven’t had a chance to look through those yet, but I will in the near future. Come January, that book will be up for preorder as well, with a release date of March 16th.
Right now, I’m writing book 8, An Empire in Disarray, with a hard deadline of 22 December (just before Christmas). Normally, I’d be panicking right now, but I’m trying out a new outlining method that seems to be working quite well. If everything works out the way I hope, I’ll finish up book 9 sometime in February and move on to other projects.
Looking back, it was a mistake to set out to write a nine-book series before knowing how the first one would do. If I could go back to 2009 and do it all over again, I’d stick to trilogies, where the first book stands well enough alone that I can abandon the other two books if it doesn’t gain much traction. That’s going to be my modus operandi from here on out.
So here are the trilogies I need to finish:
Genesis Earth Trilogy
This one has been outstanding for a long time. The first book did much better than I was expecting, and while its popularity has fallen off in recent years, it still gets very good reviews. For a first novel, I’m honestly surprised that this book has done as well as it has.
The second book, Edenfall, is still on the back burner for now. Partially written, partially outlined, it shouldn’t take more than a couple of months to get it done when I finally sit down to finish it.
As for book three, The Stars of Redemption, I have no idea because I haven’t even outlined it yet. Perhaps that’s what I need to get the ball rolling: outline the last book, so I know what has to happen in the second book. In any case.
Gunslingers Trilogy
Gunslinger to the Stars hasn’t done as well as I would have liked, but I enjoy this universe so much that I’m going to finish the trilogy if for no other reason than the fun of it. I’ve already written the first four or five chapters of Gunslinger to the Galaxy, and it’s coming along swimmingly. In fact, I’ll probably go right back to it after finishing up Sons of the Starfarers and call it a vacation. Expect to see more Jane Carter soon!
The Twelfth Sword Trilogy
I am super super excited to finish this trilogy—which is good, because the way the first book ends, it’s definitely not a standalone. Definitely not. Haven’t formally outlined it yet, but there’s a ton of stuff I’m going to throw into the second book, The Sword Bearer. Mercenaries, sorcerors, death mages, winged cataphracts, desert ruins, and mountain strongholds—it’s going to be great fun!
The Outworlds Trilogy
For a while now, I’ve been playing around with the idea of condensing all of Star Wanderers into a novel and then turning it into a trilogy. The first book will basically be made up of bits and pieces from all of the Star Wanderers novellas, spliced together to make a coherent novel. In particular, I’d like to expand on Noemi’s viewpoint and trim out some (or a lot) of the extraneous stuff that made the series drag on. Basically, turn it into less of a sci-fi romance and more of a classic space opera.
I’ve already started the sequel, Children of the Starry Sea, though I haven’t gotten past the first chapter. Where Star Wanderers is a series of novellas, though, Children of the Starry Sea is definitely a proper novel, and it would probably work a lot better to frame it as a trilogy than anything else.
I suppose it’s a bit like how Orson Scott Card turned a bunch of his early short stories into The Worthing Saga, which in my opinion is his very best book. I won’t unpublish any of the old Star Wanderers stuff, but I may just let it fade into obscurity as I push the other stuff.
These are the books that are on my mind. I’ve got to be honest: Sons of the Starfarers feels a bit like a ball and chain, but I’ve committed to finishing it and I’ll do my best to finish it well.
On the publishing front, there’s so much stuff I want to do that I’m having trouble keeping up with it all. My main goal is to get to 10k subscribers on my email list. Currently, I’m just shy of 4k. InstaFreebie has been hugely useful for that, but I’ve got to try other strategies as well. One of those strategies involves a new signup incentive, so if you’re already signed up for my email list, I’ve got a surprise for you soon.
So much stuff going on. I swear, this is the best depiction of what it’s like to be an indie author:
In case you haven’t read it yet, Outworlder is currently available on InstaFreebie in exchange for signing up for my email newsletter. This is the first Star Wanderers novella, my most popular series thus far.
If you have already picked up a copy, you may be interested in some of these other fine InstaFreebie giveaways for the month of October. I haven’t read all of these books, but they look pretty interesting and I’ll probably pick up a few on my own.
As with Outworlder, you can receive a free copy of any of the listed books in exchange for signing up to the author’s email list.
It’s September, my favorite month of the year! Maybe I’ll revisit that post in a blast from the past or something. So many reasons why September is awesome.
Things are going well on the writing front. I’ve switched up my daily routine to make more writing time, and it’s working well so far. My alarm goes off at 5:45 am (just after oh-dark-thirty) and I write for about an hour before heading off to my part time job. I’ve found that I tend to write a lot more when I start first thing in the day, so the earlier I can start, the better.
I won’t bore you with the rest of my routine, unless you want me to write a post about it. There’s a bunch of interesting lifestyle tweaks I’ve been trying out, like reading a couple chapters from one of the books I’m reading as soon as I get back from work in the afternoon, in order to refill the creative well and not get caught in a Youtube / general internet trap. Stuff like that.
My current WIP is A Queen in Hiding (Sons of the Starfarers, Book 7) which is proving to be a surprisingly difficult book. It’s definitely one of the weirdest things I’ve ever written, and that’s saying a lot. In Captives in Obscurity, Reva and Isaac get assimilated into a hive mind, and things only get crazier from there.
Sometimes, stories come really easy, almost like they spring fully formed from the mind. Other times, I’ve found I have to throw out almost the entire first draft before I discover the story.
The weird thing is that it has nothing to do with actual book length. Stars of Blood and Glory and Outworlder are totally different lengths, but they both came out almost perfect in the first draft. However, almost all of the Star Wanderers novellas took multiple drafts filled with stuff that had to be cut. Heart of the Nebula took years to finish, and I had to throw out multiple characters and subplots. I struggled for a long time with Genesis Earth, until I decided to throw the whole thing out and start with a blank page. The book was finished less than four weeks later.
The holy grail, of course, is to write a perfect book in four to six weeks (or less!) every time I set off to start a new one. But as awesome as it would be to barf rainbows and poop gold, all of those things sadly remain out of reach.
My goal at this point is to publish the last four Sons of the Starfarers books in 2018, two months apart from each other. Ideally, I’d like to have the next one up for preorder in time for the previous one’s release. It’s going to take some coordination, but I already have all the covers, which leaves just the writing and editing (metadata and formatting doesn’t take more than a day).
Unfortunately, that isn’t going to happen unless I can get A Queen in Hiding ready to go by December. So that’s what I’m trying to do.
Gunslinger to the Galaxy is on hold for now, though so far it’s coming along very nicely. I should be able to pick it up and finish without too much trouble. Edenfall is also on hold, for how much longer I really don’t know. Before the end of 2018, I’d like to publish either the one or the other, but publishing them both is probably a bit of a stretch.
Also, I haven’t even started The Sword Bearer yet (second book in the Twelfth Sword Trilogy), though I have lots of great ideas for it. Since The Sword Keeper is coming out in just a couple weeks, I should probably get on that.
On the publishing side, I dropped the ball a bit in August. It took so much energy to get The Sword Keeper ready for publication that I totally spaced publishing anything. I do have a bunch of shorts that are nearing the end of the submissions gauntlet, and some bundles that can go up too.
I don’t sell many print books, but I want to get print versions of all of my books up, including short stories. That’s going to be an ongoing project for a while. I also want to put up audiobook versions eventually, but it’s going to take some time to get that ball rolling. However, it has moved up the priority list.
That’s pretty much it. So much stuff I want to do, so little time to do it. Time, money, or youth: you can only pick two (and one of them isn’t your choice).
A friend of mine recently asked me to give him a list of all my books in series order. That was just the kick in the pants I needed to put this page together. For your convenience, I’m putting it up as a blog post too. The links to all the book pages will appear on the series page as soon as I can get around to it.
Joe Vasicek
Gaia Nova
The Gaia Nova books are all mid-sized novels (75k to 110k words). It is a far-future space opera series that takes place in a galactic empire long after Earth has been lost to legend. They can be read in any order, but they take place in the same universe with recurring characters. They are listed in the order in which they were published. Heart of the Nebula is a direct sequel to Bringing Stella Home.
Bringing Stella Home Desert Stars Stars of Blood and Glory Heart of the Nebula
Mercenary Savior (forthcoming) Empress of the Last Free Stars (forthcoming)
Star Wanderers
The Star Wanderers books are novellas (15k to 35k). They take place in the same universe as Gaia Nova one thousand years earlier. The first four books are linear, while the last four books are parallaxes of the first four, from the point of view of the side characters.
The Jeremiah Chronicles (Omnibus 1-4) Tales of the Far Outworlds (Omnibus 5-6)
Sons of the Starfarers
The Sons of the Starfarer books are short novels (35k to 45k words) that take place in the same universe as Star Wanderers, with a few recurring minor characters from those books. It is a linear series.
Brother in Exile
Comrades in Hope
Strangers in Flight
Friends in Command
Captives in Obscurity
Patriots in Retreat (forthcoming)
A Queen in Hiding (forthcoming)
An Empire in Disarray (forthcoming)
Victors in Liberty (forthcoming)
Sons of the Starfarers (Omnibus 1-3)
Gunslinger Trilogy
These books are all short to mid-sized novels (50k to 90k words). They take place about 40 years in the future, after Earth makes contact with the galactics.
Gunslinger to the Stars Gunslinger to the Galaxy (forthcoming) Gunslinger to Earth (forthcoming)
The Twelfth Sword Trilogy
These epic fantasy books are all mid-sized to long novels (85k words and up).
The Sword Keeper (forthcoming) The Sword Bearer (forthcoming) The Sword Mistress (forthcoming)
Genesis Earth Trilogy
These are all mid-sized novels (about 70k words) that take place in the near to mid-future.
Genesis Earth Edenfall (forthcoming) The Stars of Redemption (forthcoming)
Short Stories and Novelettes
Below are all of my short stories and novelettes, in the order in which they were published. If they first appeared in a magazine or anthology, I’ve included that in parentheses.
Decision LZ1527 (Leading Edge Magazine, December 2009)
Memoirs of a Snowflake
A Hill on Which to Die
Starchild
L’enfer, c’est la Solitude (Perehilion SF, March 2016)
The Curse of the Lifewalker (Sci Phi Journal, June 2016)
The Gettysburg Paradox
Utahraptors at Dawn
Welcome to Condescension
Killing Mister Wilson
My Name is For My Friends
Jane Carter of Earth and the Rescue that Never Was
The Open Source Time Machine
