Staying in Provo

So, I have some news.  After carefully weighing my options, I decided to stay here in Provo for at least another six months, rather than teach English in Korea for a year.

My main reason was the current pace of change in the publishing world.  Originally, I wanted to take a year or two off to build a TEFL career and make some money to support myself as I tried to break in, but with the way publishing is changing, if I did that I would find myself completely lost as soon as got back.

Another reason was that I wanted to be able to focus on building my indie publishing career.  Traveling and working abroad would take a lot of energy away from that, which didn’t seem like a good thing to do at this point in my writing career.

Yet another reason was the fact that Worldcon is in Reno this year, and it’s going to be huge.  Anyone who’s anyone (at least here in Utah) is going, and it would be supremely foolish to pass up a networking opportunity like that.

And also, I have to be honest: since I’m in a local band now, I kind of want to stick around and see how that works out.  Who knows?  Maybe we’ll make it big…

So what am I going to do now instead?  Probably work odd jobs to support myself, same as I’ve been doing since I graduated.  I’ve got one lined up to start next week; apparently, the guys at this alarm company where temped in April were impressed with my computer skills and want me back.  Maybe I can turn that into a part time gig once the summer’s up.  If not, there’s always the costume factory job in September-October.  And of course, I’m still keeping an eye out for local part-time jobs.

And really, all this stuff about getting a “day job” seems to me like another way of saying you can’t make a living as a writer, which strikes me as utter bull crap.  Yeah, most people don’t become full time writers–but most people aren’t willing to do what it takes to get there.  I am.  I’m also fortunate enough to be in a good position to shoot for it.  Young, single, no dependents, no debt…it doesn’t get any better than that.

In tangentially related news, my first guest post from my blog tour went live yesterday.  My friend Nick Rose interviewed me and asked about epublishing, getting good cover art, what makes novels unique, and why I’m drawn to science fiction.

Nick is an aspiring novelist like me who’s hoping to turn this into a full time career.  He’s also a great writer, even if his tastes are a little different than mine (seriously man, how can you NOT love Star Wars?  Come on!).  He writes mostly horror and reads a lot of manga, which he reviews on his blog.  He also updates his blog every day, so check him out!

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!

AHHH! It’s uploaded!

That’s right; just a few minutes ago, I uploaded Genesis Earth to the Amazon Kindle store.  It’ll take about 24 hours to show up on the site, at which point the entire universe will implode and we’ll all become robots fighting for survival in an artificial reality.  So get ready!

That beautiful image on the left is the cover, by the way.  Pretty awesome, neh?  It turned out even better than I was hoping it would.

Genesis Earth is my first epublished novel, and as such, I feel happy, nervous, excited, and ecstatic about it all at the same time.  The short stories were one thing, but this–this is the real deal.  This is me jumping in with both feet and not looking back.

It’s been a long and arduous road to publication, and I want to thank all of you who have been a part of it.  I plan on sending out a free copy to all of my first readers as a thank you gift; if for some reason I miss you, please let me know and I’ll get that sent out to you.

Finally, if you still want to get in on the blog tour, let me know and I’ll sign you up.  I’m not going to set up a strict schedule, but I’ll probably do three or four blogs a week, so either send me a topic to blog about or a set of interview questions, and I’ll get back to you as promptly as I can.

Man, this is exciting!  I’m sure that the road ahead won’t be easy, but at least things are now in motion.  This awesome novel has sat on my flash drive for far too long–time to put it out for people to discover.  It might take months for it to find its natural readership, but I’m confident that it eventually will.

Expect a post in the next 24 hours with more details.  Until then, prepare yourselves!

“…and I am doing my best to leave traditional publishing behind.” –Tracy Hickman

Those were Tracy Hickman’s exact words today at CONduit.

He said it as part of his introductory remarks at his first panel, “To Cliche Or Not To Cliche,” and reiterated it on all of the panels he was on for the rest of the day.

For those of you who don’t know, Tracy Hickman has built a career spanning over thirty years, and has 56 novels still in print.  He is an incredibly successful and prolific author.  What’s more, he is quite possibly the most humble and sincere person at the convention: extremely approachable, and very accommodating towards his fans.  He is an amazing man, and I hope to have a career like his someday.

He’s not the only big name author talking about epublishing either.  I heard this secondhand so it’s not admissible in court, but L.E. Modesitt apparently had a lot to say about Kristine Katherin Rusch‘s recent blog posts concerning the disturbing changes in traditional publishing.  Rusch is one of the voices at the epicenter of the indie publishing movement, along with her husband Dean Wesley Smith.

The initial shock wave of the ebook revolution has hit Utah, and people all over CONduit are talking about it.  In fact, I think I spent more time today in the hall talking about ebooks than I did attending panels.

You have no idea how invigorated this makes me feel.  I’ve been going around signing up bloggers for my Genesis Earth blog tour, and the sense of ownership I feel for my career is thrilling.  On my way back to Provo, I made a connection between two ideas for my current work-in-progress, and I literally screamed for two minutes straight.  I don’t know if I’ve ever been more excited to be a writer.

In his last panel of the day, Tracy Hickman closed with the following bold statement: if you master the art of story structure, have the dedication to work hard, and are willing to do what it takes to learn your craft, you will not only write a successful book, you will build a successful career in this world of new media.

That, my friends, is exactly where I want to be.

Stoked for CONduit and a sneak peek

CONduit starts tomorrow in Salt Lake City, and I am so stoked!

This will be my third year in a row, and it looks like all the usuals are going to be there: Dan Wells, Howard Tayler, Dave Farland, L.E. Modesitt, Tracy and Laura Hickman–in other words, a whole bunch of awesome people.  It’s gonna be fun!

As usual, I’ll be recording all the panels I attend.  Shoot me an email if you want the mp3s.  I’ll also try to give a report on this blog, though it might be a bit sparse.

This year, I’m hoping mainly to get the ball rolling for the ebook release of my novel Genesis Earth. Local cons are great for networking with other writers, and hopefully I can get a few more people to sign up on the blog tour I’m trying to get started.

If you’re a blogger / blogging writer and you’d like to participate, here’s how it works: you give me either a topic for a blog post or a list of interview-type questions.  I’ll write it up post and send it to you, along with the cover image for Genesis Earth. In the post, you include the image and a link to amazon where people can find the novel.  When the post goes live, I’ll mention it here and put up a link so my readers can find it.

You get a free guest post, I get publicity for my book, and we both cross pollinate readers and build our blog audience.  Win-win-win all around.

So yeah, shoot me an email if you want to participate.  Genre-wise, Genesis Earth is a YA science fiction romance; basically, it’s a coming-of-age love story with starships, wormholes, and first contact.  If you think your blog readers would be into that kind of thing, I’d be more than happy to put you on the tour list!

Finally, I have some eye candy for you: my cover artist, Hideyoshi, just sent me the final proof and it looks pretty friggin sweet.  Check it out:

Aaahh!  I’m so stoked to get this book out!

Tag and such

So my cousin Angela tagged me in this cross-linking truth-or-dare blog game, and it looks fun so I figured I’d participate.  Here goes:

Do you think you’re hot?

I suffer from no illusions as to my ability (or rather, lack thereof) to carnally attract the opposite sex.  That’s not to say I’m ugly, but when you apply the Pareto principle to dating (and let’s be honest, it’s really more of a 90/10 split), I don’t make the cut.

And you know what?  I’m fine with that.  Because it only takes one…

What is  your current desktop wallpaper?

This glorious image from APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day).  It’s enough to make me want to move to Iceland, and that’s saying something.

When was the last time you ate chicken?

I made some awesome fajitas last week, and the chicken was on sale at Maceys.  I always cook my own chicken; I hate the precooked frozen stuff.

What were you thinking as you were doing this?

Who comes up with these things anyway?  Hmm, I wonder if I could start one…

Do you have nicknames?

I have two internet screen names, which are probably the only nicknames of mine that are still in use (besides the ones people use behind my back).  The first is “onelowerlight,” and it’s all over the place.  The second I use only on deviant art and a certain fan-fiction site, and it is and shall remain a closely guarded secret.

Tag eight blogger friends…

Alright, let’s do this.  LEEERRROYYY…

Gods, Witches, Space & Stars
Kate in Katy
Myself as Written
One Modern Mormon
Truthiness
Fertilizer
Not A Villain (technically a webcomic not a blog, but hey she’s an old friend)
سفريات أنثون

Who’s listed as number one?

My old writing friend Laura, who just got back from an LDS mission in Armenia.  Has a lot of interesting and insightful things to say, such as her last post on the difference between strong female characters who are independent vs. strong female characters who are interdependent.

Say something about number five.

Sarah is one of my little sisters, and she just had a baby!  Also, she worked for a couple years in a survivalist-oriented wilderness therapy program, and knows how to make traps, kill and eat animals, and make fire with sticks and a bow.  Oh, and she’s also hilarious.  If I’m ever stranded on a desert island, she’s my first pick for who I’d want with me.

How did you get to know number three?

Chuck?  I think she showed up at a writing group meeting when I was VP of Quark.  She was never really active in the club, but we also took Sanderson’s 318 class a couple times and went to CONduit in 2008 together.  Meh; she’s alright, I guess (jk!).

How about number four?

(who comes up with these questions?)

Mykle is my geekiest brother in law, at least in terms of books and sf&f fandom (linux, that would be Danny).  He married Sarah two months after meeting her and I think it was the best decision either of them ever made.  He doesn’t blog much, but when he does, it’s always thoughtful and interesting.

Leave a message for number six

Thanks Kindal for the feedback on Worlds Away! Blunt as always but quite helpful.

Leave a lovey-dovey message for number two

For my sister?? Ewwwww…

Seriously Kate, I love your blog.  And you have the freaking cutest daughter on the face of the planet.  Thanks for making me an uncle!

Do number seven and number eight have any similarities?

Yes, in fact.  Aneeka (no. 7) spent a couple years teaching English in Japan; Anthon (no. 8 ) hasn’t spent more than a week or two in the same place (or more than a month or two on the same continent) for the last two years.  Let me just say, I am in awe of these world travelers and hope to do likewise at some point in the future.

That’s it folks.  At least I have chicken.

First review and an announcement

So shortly after I joined the Kindle Boards, Michelle from Red Adept Reviews contacted me for a blog interview to go along with a review she was doing for “From the Ice Incarnate.” The review and interview were posted over the weekend; you can find them here.

The review is generally positive, though I think the criticism is pretty fair; I’m much better at writing novels than writing short stories.  It was a pleasant surprise, however, to have a reviewer come to me, and to come so quickly.  I honestly wasn’t expecting that, so thanks!

“From the Ice Incarnate” is based on a scene from my novel Genesis Earth, which I will be epublishing very soon.  I just got the initial sketches from the cover artist I selected, and they look really good!  The only other holdup is my copy editor, and he should be finished by Wednesday, so hopefully the novel will be out in a week or so.

In order to spread the word, I’d like to put together a blog tour.  If you have a blog and would like me to write a guest post, that would be awesome!  Just email me with a subject to discuss, or a list of interview questions, and I’ll let you know when I can fit you in.  I’ll also post a link on this site, so my readers here can find your blog.

So anyhow, that’s what’s going on here.  I’m very excited to get Genesis Earth out, and also that my work is starting to get some attention.  Hopefully, that will continue to build; in the meantime, I’ll keep on doing what I always do: write.

Rocking the rewrite

I am well into the third draft of Worlds Away from Home, and oh man–it is so much fun! That might seem a bit counter-intuitive (revising = fun?), so let me explain my process.

In a first draft, I have a ton of ideas, but it’s hard for me to keep track of them all (and they also tend to change even as I write them).  I’ll cobble together a story out of them, but it’s a rough, misshapen story, with subplots that go nowhere, characters who seem schizophrenic, scenes set in the wrong point of view, and setting details that are inconsistent.  The main throughline is still there, but it’s buried under a ton of crap, sometimes so much that even I can’t see it.

In a second draft, I cut out the worst of the crap and try to dig out the core story elements.  I’ll cut entire chapters and subplots, throw out characters, rework the world, and fix as many of the glaring errors as I can.

Some writers call this a “triage edit,” and that’s as apt a term for it as any.  I’m not doing surgery yet; I’m applying the field dressings that will get the wounded from the battlefield to the operating table.

But the third draft, by far, is my favorite.  That’s when I take a hard look at the story and figure out how everything connects.  It’s like dumping out a new Lego set and opening up the instructions.  This is where I iron out the major character arcs, where I start to intertwine the subplots properly, where I get a sense of the book’s themes and figure out how to make it insightful and thought provoking.

Writing the third draft is absolutely glorious, and I love it.

Right now, I feel so immersed in the world of my novel, it makes me want to lock myself in a room and do nothing but write.  I have to force myself to go to bed, otherwise I’d be up until 4am writing.  Even with some of the major changes I need to make with this book, I wouldn’t be surprised if I average 4k or 5k words per day for the next two weeks (about all the time I have before I have to go back to work).

I finished the third draft of Genesis Earth in less than three weeks.  I finished the third draft of Bringing Stella Home in considerably more time than that, but that was partially because of other real-world stuff out of my control (like a nightmarish internship), but between that and the fourth draft, it was much the same thing.

So anyhow, I’m having an awesome time revising Worlds Away from Home, and the finished draft is going to be AWESOME.  And next to changing someone’s life with one of your books, that’s probably one of the best feelings you can have as a writer.

Man, writing is so much fun. 🙂

Buy me lunch and I’ll teach you how to make an ebook

Okay, this is insane.  For a long time, I’ve kept up with Writer Beware as a source for quality news about publishing scams, but now…huh?

Recently, Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Katherine Rusch have been giving a TON of warnings about “agent-publishers” –agents who are electronically publishing their clients when they’re supposed to represent their clients’ interests to publishers.

DWS and KKR have both been unequivocal about this–any agent doing this is running a scam and should be avoided like the plague.  And you know what?  I believe them.  Why?  Because using entirely free and/or open source software, I can create a professionally formatted ebook from any of my manuscripts in less than an hour. 

Less than an hour.

And I’m not a computer expert either, just a blogger who knows some basic html (which you, too, can learn free of charge at w3schools).

Well, just today I read a post on Writer Beware about these agent-publishers that made my jaw drop.  Summary: agents who ran publishing operations used to be considered scammers, but things have changed so that that’s legit now.  The phrase that really got to me was “unimpeachably reputable agencies.”

Huh?

According to DWS and KKR, these “unimpeachably reputable agencies” become scammers the moment they start publishing their clients’ works.  Clearly, someone is wrong, and my own experience tells me it isn’t DWS or KKR.

Making a professional looking ebook is literally easier than writing a query or a synopsis.  Light years easier.  Paying someone a commission for doing it is like writing the boy down the street who mows your lawn into your mortgage contract.  It makes literally no business sense.

And yet people still think that this agent-publisher things is legitimate?  Wha…?

Okay, you know what?  If you’re a writer in the Provo/Orem area, I’ll show you everything I know about making an ebook if you’ll buy me lunch.  Heck, if you live in Salt Lake and are willing to take me to this awesome Lebanese place, I’ll make a special trip just for you!

I’ll show you what you need to download, install it for you, teach you how it works, and run you step by step through the formatting process until you have a beautiful ebook on your hard drive.  I’ll teach you everything I know (which honestly isn’t that much), and I’ll do it all for the price of lunch.  Just email me at joseph [dot] vasicek [at] gmail [dot] com, and I’ll write you into my schedule.

Why would I take the time out of my day (and away from my own writing) to do this?  Well, for one, I really like Lebanese food.  But more importantly, it’s in all of our interests as writers that none of us get caught up in these crazy scams.  They don’t benefit us and will actually hurt us all in the long run, if we let them happen.

So yes, once again, if you’re a writer living anywhere between Provo and Salt Lake City, I will show you everything I know about formatting ebooks if you will buy me lunch. I’m not even joking.

And I love Lebanese food.  Once we’re finished, I think you will too.

Drawing up the starmaps

I’m a big fan of indirect sequels, where each book tells a standalone story but incorporates many of the same characters as other works and is set in the same world.  Sharon Creech did this with Walk Two Moons and Absolutely Normal Chaos: the main character from ANC was a minor character in WTM.

The thing is, I write space opera, which means that each novel spans at least two or three different star systems.  After four or five novels, it can get really hard to remember where all the stars are in relation to each other.  So, taking my own advice from an earlier post, I drew up a starmap for my universe.

For a pattern, I used these maps of the region of space local to Sol.  I’ve since forgotten where I got them; I think wikipedia, or maybe the atomic rockets site:

Since they’re only 2-dimensional, they have some obvious shortcomings, but for my purposes they work just fine.  The thing I like the most about these maps is that they show rough distributions of interstellar gas and dust.  In my Gaia Nova universe, areas of high density (such as the interiors of nebulae) are off limits to the FTL technology, so finding a way to show that was absolutely critical.

And so, after playing around with MS Paint and The Gimp, this is what I came up with:

It’s definitely a work in progress (seeing as I’ve only got about a dozen stars up so far), but I’ve got to be honest–I geeked out hardcore when I was finished with this thing.  Whether you’re writing fantasy or science fiction adventure (which I’d argue is a branch of fantasy), there’s just something about having a map…

The best thing is that it’s REALLY easy to update.  If I want, I can throw up half a dozen new stars in fifteen minutes–or rearrange the current arrangement of stars with the simple click of a mouse.  That’s good, because I don’t want to spend all my time drawing up maps–the map is just a tool to help me write the stories.

And oh man, I’ve got a lot of stories to tell! 🙂