Category: Uncategorized

New plan for the newsletter

So my fiancee helped me to put together a proper newsletter template for my email list, and it looks pretty good! Much better than the template I wrote myself, and I’m not a programmer (she is).

This gives me the opportunity to make some changes to the way I do things, and I’ve decided to grab the bull by the horns. I’m going to write a proper newsletter, not just a simple “here’s some book deals and a couple of promos to check out!” Here’s the new format:

Welcome

A short, 1-3 sentence “Hello, dear reader! I hope this email finds you well,” etc etc. Kind of like I already do.

Featured Book

The main call to action, put at the top for the casual readers who don’t have a lot of time or interest for much else. This may be a preorder, or a new release, or a special offer. Or it may just be a full-price book that I want to feature, for whatever reason. I’ll have to play around with it and see what works.

I’ve decided to go back to the two-button approach: one that says BUY ON AMAZON and goes directly to Amazon, albeit without an affiliate link, and one that says ALL OTHER STORES and goes to the book page here on my blog. For some reason, Amazon won’t let you put affiliate links in emails, which makes this a tough either/or. I’ll get more click-through and sales with a direct link, which is going to cost affiliate income, but I think it’s more important to focus on my own books than it is to game the affiliate system—at least in this section.

Writing Update

This is a brief, 1-2 paragraph section just below the featured book, where I give an update on my current WIP, along with a status bar. Basically, an accountability section, as well as something to keep the fans up-to-date on my writing progress.

Author’s Note

This is the meat of the newsletter, where in 3-5 paragraphs I share something personal with my readers: either a story or insight from the writing process, a behind-the-scenes look at what I do, or something else. In a recent newsletter, I talked about my grandfather and how his entrepreneurial spirit has rubbed off on me. Stuff like that.

From time to time, I also plan to share book recommendations. With my fiancee’s help, I may design a second template with an Author’s Note section that’s better set up for that.

The goal is to provide my readers with a personal connection and something of value that goes beyond “buy my book!” I already do this in the back of all of my novels, and have from the very beginning, so it will be fun to do something similar in my email newsletter.

Book Promotions

This is where I put all the links to all the promotions that I’m currently participating in, usually with other authors. I already do this in my newsletters, and it seems to be fairly popular, so it seems like something I should integrate into its own section, probably towards the bottom so as to incentive readers to scroll down.

Parting Quote

This is something new: a pull quote from the featured book to close out the email. Nothing too long; just enough to give my readers a taste and hopefully leave them intrigued, or thoughtful, or otherwise interested in reading more.

Farewell

The standard “so long, and thanks for reading!” that I always end on. Not a bad catch-phrase for a writer, I suppose.

So that’s the new format. Because I plan to share frequent writing updates in my newsletter, I’ll probably leave off sharing those updates here on my blog. Besides, that’s not really the strength of this medium: blogging is much better suited for community building, brand engagement, and public discussion. I may still share major updates, but not regularly.

That’s pretty much it. If you have any suggestions or other opinions, feel free to share. Also, you can sign up for my newsletter here if you haven’t already done so. That’s going to be the best way to keep up with me from here on out.

Take care, and thanks for reading!

And you call yourself a writer??

So I got into another online political debate on a writer’s forum last month. Shocking, I know. This one started with a discussion of political correctness and an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal, and quickly devolved into an argument about corporate censorship, gun control, Trump, and every other controversial issue in politics. Needless to say, it didn’t take long for people to cry reee and let loose the frogs of war.

That’s not the interesting part, though. Before the discussion devolved into a dumpster fire, I asked one of my more outspoken opponents a simple question:

I’m curious, Perry. Are you capable of seeing the world through the eyes of someone who disagrees with you politically?

To which he responded:

I used to be, before they started endorsing hate speech and supporting authoritarian sociopaths. Now I’ve got no patience for people who believe in a society built on a foundation of inequality and selfishness.

Now, perhaps this was naive of me, but I honestly was looking forward to the challenge of trying to reflect this guy’s own views back to him. I was looking forward to him doing the same for me. After all, isn’t that what writers are supposed to do? Put ourselves in a character’s head, and show that character’s perspective?

It blows my mind that people who call themselves writers can have absolutely no interest in seeing things through the eyes of the people they disagree with. Even if those people really are evil (and in almost all cases, they really aren’t), it’s still a good idea to study how they see the world, because some of the most interesting characters are evil to the core.

Anyone who takes this stance must write horribly dull books. Their bad guys and villains must be one-dimentional cardboard cutouts, or pyromaniacal straw men. The most compelling antagonists always believe that they are the heroes of their own stories, just like everyone else, and the more compelling the story they tell themselves, the more interesting the character.

For example, consider King Candy from Wreck-it Ralph. He was absolutely a villain, but he had a very compelling story for why he was right to keep Vanellope from racing. Never mind that he was an imposter in what was actually Vanellope’s game.

In any case, I think that if we want to write well, we absolutely need to do our best to see the world through the eyes of the people we disagree with. Even if they’re wrong. Especially if they’re wrong. And if our own views are so rigid that we cannot bring ourselves to do this, then maybe we should take a good, hard look in the mirror. After all, how can we hope to change the world if we can’t—or won’t—change ourselves?

Reworking The Paradox of Choice

The events in New York and Virginia of the past couple of weeks have been interesting, to say the least. The abortion debate has escalated dramatically, with talk of fourth-trimester abortions and keeping the infant “comfortable” while “a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.”

Without getting too much into the politics of it, this discusion has put me in a very awkward position regarding one of my stories. It’s a very short piece, titled “The Paradox of Choice,” and it depicts two women having a conversation about whether or not to “abort” a baby who’s already been born. The narrative is entirely dialog, so it isn’t clear until the middle of the story that they’re talking about a living, breathing baby who happens to be sitting between them.

I wrote the story as a bit of a shock piece, to show that the line between infanticide and aborting an unborn child isn’t as clear as people think. When I wrote it, though, I thought that infanticide would still be considered abhorrent. I had no idea that the Overton window would shift as quickly as it has.

Hence the awkward position. Clearly, this story needs to be rewritten, but how? Expanded, perhaps? By adding more descriptions to actually show the baby? Or do I need to abandon the “shock piece” aspect and turn it into more of a reasoned discussion of evil?

I wasn’t originally going to write this piece, but a couple of years ago I felt a strong impression that I needed to. Even then, I only did about the minimum of what I needed to do to get it onto the page. This isn’t the sort of thing that I usually write. But now, I suppose I need to revisit it and put in the effort to make it properly shine.

Either way, it’s insane how quickly the debate is shifting.

I’m engaged!

So a couple of days ago, I proposed to the girl I’ve been dating for the past few months. She’s pretty amazing. She’s currently at BYU, getting a masters in computer science. Where I make stuff up for a living, she actually makes stuff happen.

The funny thing is that we were both in Brandon Sanderson’s English 318R class back in 2009, even though we didn’t know each other at the time. She also lived in German house at the FLSR (Foreign Language Student Residence) during the summer I was on the Jordan study abroad. I lived in the Arabic house the year before and the year after. Also, after I came back from Jordan, she studied at the BYU Jerusalem Center.

So many near misses, but the way we actually met was through an online dating app. A couple of years ago, I wondered if I should try online dating, but I got this feeling like I should wait. Then around June of 2018, I got this feeling that the time had come to set up a profile and start looking around.

We started dating back in September, and decided to go exclusive after watching Venom (kind of a weird movie to cuddle together at, but still fun). I spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with her family in Provo, and apparently made a good impression. While playing a board game, her six year-old niece smiled at me and said “you’re my uncle!” to which I replied “not quite.”

Dating this girl has been a real adventure. Without getting into all the personal details, I can say that she’s got everything I’ve been looking for, and then some. On one of our earlier dates, we did an exercise where we each listed twenty things we wanted out of life, and five of those things were on both of our lists.

So yeah, she’s a keeper. I secretly met with her parents last weekend, and proposed on Tuesday. Nothing elaborate, just went on a walk around campus after eating lunch together. We’ve talked about getting married before, so after asking if there was anything else she felt we needed to talk about, I said “I can think of one thing,” got down on one knee, and took out the ring.

We’re planning to get married in June. My dad will be out of school by then, and hopefully my sister and her boyfriend will have their residency papers in Brazil figured out so that they can come. It feels like a long engagement period, and perhaps for a Latter-day Saint wedding it is, but I can be patient. Probably.

Good things are definitely happening!

Extra Sci-Fi S3E1: Tolkien and Herbert, the World Builders

So I really enjoyed the first two seasons of Extra Sci-Fi, and since they’ve just started up with season three, I’d like to do a blog series where I react to the episodes.

From the first episode, it looks like the main focus of this season is on Lord of the Rings and Dune, two SF&F classics which I’ve read twice. While I have read The Silmarillion as well, I have to admit that I haven’t read any of the Dune sequels yet. Ah, the woes of a horribly massive TBR list.

In any case, the discussion of intentionality in world-building is quite interesting. The way they contrast it with the pulps got me to thinking about the direction science fiction and fantasy are headed in right now.

With the advent of indie publishing, the era we are living in right now is much more akin to the age of the pulps. The way most indies make a living is by following Kevin J. Anderson’s advice to be prolific—really, really prolific. That doesn’t mean that all books published these days lack the intentionality and depth of the great classics of the genre, but the pendulum seems to have swung in the other direction.

Here’s the problem: I’m sure there are books that are just as finely crafted as Lord of the Rings that are sitting on someone’s hard drive right now, or perhaps hanging out somewhere above the 500,000 ranking on Amazon. Perhaps some of these books are even more masterfully crafted, with greater intentionality and even more depth. Why aren’t they selling?

Lots of reasons. Perhaps the author hasn’t yet mastered the craft of writing. Perhaps the story isn’t compelling enough—the equivalent of a 50 cc engine in the body of a Harley.

Or perhaps it has nothing to do with the quality of the writing or storytelling, but the author’s lack of marketing acumen. The greatest product in the world is worth nothing if nobody knows it exists. Likewise, the worst product is worth at least something if everyone knows about it.

Harsh truths, but that’s the world we live in. I’m not so cynical that I believe that writing is a zero-sum game, but there is a lot of competition, especially with how many books are being published these days. That’s why I say that the pendulum has swung back in favor of pulp-style writing: because the writer who can put out a book a month and put it out to an email list of 10k or more has a decisive advantage over the writer who painstakingly crafts a magnificent epic over the course of an entire lifetime, as Tolkien did.

When will the pendulum swing back? I don’t know, but it’s actually not as daunting of an issue as the guys at Extra Credits make it seem.

The first time I read Dune, I was in high school. The second time, I was in college, where I’d already studied Arabic for a couple of years and become somewhat proficient at it. Studying Arabic pulled back the curtain a bit, and made me realize that Herbert’s world-building wasn’t quite as intentional as it seems at first glance.

There was still a lot of depth and intentionality in the major stuff, like the Bene Gesserit, the mentats and Orange Catholic Bible, and of course the ecology of Arakkis and the Spacing Guild. However, on some of the minor details, he occasionally cribbed or made up stuff, he just did a really good job of disguising it. Even the wider arcs of his world-building have borrowed heavily from the real world, such as the rise of the Fremen (which is basically the Rashidun Caliphate in space) and the politics and economics of the spice trade (which is basically a sci-fi version of the petrodollar).

This is why I’m not too worried. A masterful writer can produce on the level of the pulps, and still write with depth and intentionality—or at least, fake it so well that it feels that way. Writing that well requires skill, but once you’ve figured out all the levers behind the curtain, you really can pull off some truly amazing stuff.

I’m not quite there yet, but I’ve seen behind the curtain, and I’m figuring out how it works. Until now, I’ve leaned more toward the pulp-style of writing, just to get my writing career off the ground, but I hope to get to the level of Herbert and Tolkien before too long. It’s definitely possible, but can it be profitable too? That’s the tricky part.

My LTUE Schedule

Life, the Universe, and Everything is happening in Provo, Utah in just a few days, and I will be there! I plan to spend all day Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at the symposium, so if you want to catch up with me, just find me in the lobby or wandering around the dealer’s room.

Here’s my schedule:

Thursday, February 14

Alternative Worlds: Unconventional Science Fiction and Fantasy (2:00 pm)

Scott R. Parkin (moderator), Charlie N. Holmberg, Joe Vasicek, M. Todd Gallowglas, Michaelbrent Collings

There are few things more discouraging than opening up a new book and getting the feeling that you’ve already been there and done that. Avoid this by learning about the speculative fiction worlds that really took you somewhere else–somewhere alien and impossible.

Saturday, February 16

Writing Stories without Villains (4:00 pm)

Scott R. Parkin (moderator), Christopher Husberg, Joe Vasicek, Peter Orullian, Suzanne Vincent

Antagonists do not have to be people. How to have conflict and a satisfactory resolution without a bad guy.

Heroic not Invincible: Writing Relatable Protagonists (6:00 pm)

Michelle Witte (moderator), Joe Vasicek, Joshua W. Robertson, Kathryn Purdie, Marion G. Harmon

We want to read strong heroes but not too strong, not too perfect. How to write an interesting and dimensional protagonist that people want to like.

Hope to see you there!

Politically incorrect thoughts on intersectional authorship

I’m subscribed to six or seven short story podcasts, and I’ve noticed a trend on them recently. Before they start the story, they introduce the author by first listing all of the intersectional minority identities that the author qualifies for, like “queer,” “transgender,” “immigrant,” “disabled,” “person of color,” etc.

Whenever story starts off like this, I immediately delete it form my podcast.

I’m a busy guy. I’m subscribed to far too many podcasts to listen to every episode. There’s just not enough time. If I have a reason to skip it, I will.

When the first thing you tell me about the author of a story is where he/she/ze/your majesty falls on the intersectional victimhood stack, that tells me a couple of things. First, it tells me that the editors subscribe to this bullshit idea that victimhood makes you virtuous. It doesn’t.

Second, it tells me that the editors didn’t think that the story could stand on its own. Instead of giving a typical author bio, with a few incidental facts and a cute aside about the author’s wife/kids/pets/plans for world domination, the editors decided to lead with the author’s victimhood status. Because that’s why I should listen to the story. Because victimhood is virtuous, and if you don’t listen to this story after learning just how much of a victim the author is, that makes you a racist sexist transphobic Nazi fascist.

Fuck that.

I’m sure this post will generate outrage among some circles. There was a time when I would try to respond genuinely to such outrage, apologizing for causing offense and vowing to try better to understand, sympathize, and accept the experiences of…

Fuck that.

If it offends you that I automatically delete these sorts of podcasts, go fuck yourself. Seriously. Call yourself an autosexual and see where that put you on the intersectional victimhood stack. I don’t give a shit about your outrage. I couldn’t care less about how triggered you are right now. If that makes me a fascist, so be it. To paraphrase Syndrome from the Incredibles, when everyone’s a fascist, no one’s a fascist. (Which is very convenient for actual fascists.)

By the way, I’m not actually opposed to stories written by immigrants, or lesbians, or transgenders, or people of color. I’ve listened to quite a few good ones. “And Then There Were N – 1” from Escape Pod was really fun. So was “Octo-Heist in Progress” from Clarkesworld a couple of months back. Neither of which were introduced by describing just how many oppressed victimhood classes the author qualified for.

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from the Trump era, it’s that when people call you a racist sexist transphobic Nazi fascist, they really just want to bully you into silence. But all bullies are cowards at heart. If they want to silence you, it’s because they know that they’re wrong.

Can we please return to the time when everyone acknowledged that stories should stand or fall on their own merits, not on the merits of the author? Mur Lafferty did quite a few ISBW epidodes on this, and she’s hardly a right-wing type. By all means, let’s bring all the queers and wierdos along. Science fiction wouldn’t be the same without them. But let’s not use a double standard when it comes to their stories.

After all, that would be racist.

Why my books are no longer available in paperback

All of my books are available as ebooks, but only a few of them were available in print. Until now. If you’ve looked to buy one of my paperbacks, you may have noticed that none my books are available in print. Why?

TL;DR: KDP Paperback sucks monkey balls, and I’m not going to sell a book if I can’t assure my readers that the product will meet an acceptable level of quality.

I originally published my paperbacks through CreateSpace, before they were acquired by Amazon. The books they printed were great, and I never had a problem with any of them. On the contrary, whenever I had a question about the publishing process, their customer service team far exceeded my expectations and helped to shepherd many of my books to final publication.

I learned a lot of things the hard way, and made a lot of mistakes along the way. But that was all on me. When I finally figured out the right way to do what I wanted, I could alway count on CreateSpace to produce a quality product.

Fast forward to 2018. Amazon shuttered CreateSpace and began the migration of all of their books to KDP Paperback. I loved CreateSpace, but I also saw the writing on the wall, and migrated my books early. I also published several new paperbacks through KDP Paperback, using their cover creator program.

The publishing process went about as smoothly as it had through CreateSpace. The customer service wasn’t nearly as good, but I had a pretty good idea what I was doing, and with a little experimentation, I was able to produce a quality product.

Or so I thought.

I always order proofs when putting together a paperback, and scrutinize that proof carefully before approving it. For Heart of the Nebula and The Sword Keeper, I had to go through a couple of proofs before I was satisfied that I’d gotten it right. The most common problem was that the front cover would bleed onto the spine. After a couple of failed adjustments on the KDP Paperback cover creator, I decided to just upload the jpg and not futz with it, letting the program adjust it instead. And for a time, that seemed to work.

For the Star Wanderers books, I did the same thing, letting the KDP Paperback cover creator do its thing without futzing with the placement of the front cover image. A couple of the proof copies had the bleeding problem, but after following a couple of online discussions, it seemed that the consensus was that the proof copies were of lesser quality than the actual customer copies.

That should have been a red flag right there, but I went ahead and approved them anyway, since the bleed was only about a millimeter or so, and I couldn’t justify the expense of another eight proof copies.

Big mistake.

A couple of months later, I ordered about $100 worth of author copies to sell at conventions. This was the result:

Every damn book had the cover bleed problem. Every. Damn. Book. And it wasn’t a small print error, either. The bleed was as much as 3 millimeters on some copies.

Keep in mind that except for Genesis Earth, all of these covers were designed through KDP Paperback cover creator. Also keep in mind that aside from a couple of the Star Wanderers books, this printing error was not present in any of the proofs that I approved.

Genesis Earth was particularly troubling, because that was a book that I migrated from CreateSpace. None of the author copies that I’d ordered from CreateSpace ever demonstrated this printing error. In fact, I’d gone through several proofs to ensure that the front cover image was completely outside of the red zone, to ensure that such a bleed problem would never be an issue.

KDP’s customer service promises that they respond to every issue within 24 hours. That is a lie. My first inquiry received no reply—not even the standard copy-paste boilerplate response that they usually send first.

I waited three days and sent a second inquiry, threatening to email Jeff Bezos and pull all of my books if I did not receive a response within 24 hours. As you can probably surmise, I did not get a response within 24 hours.

I did eventually get a response, and ultimately I did get a partial refund for my books. But by then, I’d had enough.

KDP Paperback produces an unacceptably inferior product. Furthermore, their customer service is terrible. Because I cannot asure my readers that they will receive an acceptable quality book, I have decided to pull all of my paperbacks from KDP Paperback and go through someone else.

It may take a few months to figure this out, in which time, my books unfortunately will not be available in print. However, I think that this will be the best solution in the long run. I’ve heard good things about Ingram Spark, so I’ll check them out, but it may take a while to do things properly.

And this time, I’m not going to take any half measures.

The Honor of the Queen by David Weber

I really enjoyed On Basilisk Station, the first book in the Honor Harrington series, and the second book did not disappoint. It had all of the stuff that made the first book so amazingly awesome, plus tons more action and political intrigue.

The dynamics in The Honor of the Queen were a bit different, in that Honor has definitely proved herself by now and is no longer the underdog freshman starship commander in the armpit of the galaxy. This time, she’s been given a small fleet, and assigned to an important diplomatic people with a critical potential ally of the Star Kingdom of Manticore.

But she still has a lot of proving to do, this time to the misogynistic people of Grayson who do not believe that women are capable of military command. If that sets off red flags, don’t worry: David Weber is no SJW, and this book was written long before “protect wamen” was a thing. The misogyny on Grayson has nothing to do with mansplaining, manspreading, or toxic masculinity: rather, it’s a culture that treats women literally as property, with none of the rights that women currently enjoy in the West.

One of the things that makes the Honor Harrington books so fantastic is the meticulous attention to detail. The history of Grayson is complex and nuanced, and presents a consistent and believable explanation for why the culture developed the way it did. Weber’s attention to detail extends beyond the world building to just about every aspect of the story: the characters, tactics, politics, and everything else. There’s a bit of handwaving when it comes to the technology—this is science fiction, after all—but not very much. Certainly, there’s no handwaving when it comes to human nature.

The part of the story that I found most interesting was the political intrigue between the Star Kingdom of Manticore and the People’s Republic of Haven. Honor’s enemy counterpart in the Havenite fleet is no pushover—in many ways, he’s just as sharp and capable as she is. Even though the People’s Republic of Haven are clearly the bad guys, I came away from this book thinking that Weber could easily write a book with the Havenite commander as the protagonist, and it would have been just as good. There are definitely bad guys and good guys, but they’re all still people, with reasons for believing the things that they do, right or wrong as they may be.

My only criticism of this book is that the ending felt a bit Mary Sue-ish with all of the accolades and promotions that Honor Harrington received. I still really enjoyed it, but if I didn’t already love the character, there were a couple of things that would have made me roll my eyes. Then again, truth is stranger than fiction, and I’m sure there are people who have received just as many honors and accolades as Honor Harrington did at the end of this one.

All in all, an excellent continuation to the series that builds on the first book and leaves plenty of room for more, especially in the rivalry between Manticore and Haven. Since that’s one of my favorite things about this series so far, I’m very interested to see what happens in the next book!