Worldcon 2011 – Page 2 – One Thousand And One Parsecs

Craving another retreat

Last night, I got together with an old friend from last year and went camping down in Sanpete county, in the Manti-Lasal National Forest. Even though I didn’t get a whole lot of writing done, it was a much needed change of scenery.

Man, southern Utah is so different from the Salt Lake and Utah valleys. More rural, more laid back, more of a back-country attitude but not in a California kind of way…I don’t know if that makes any sense, but I like it out there. It feels like the kind of place you’d pass through on a road trip, that mystic old-time Americana that always feels like it’s just out of reach. Part of me wants to settle down in a place like that someday, while the other part doesn’t want to settle down ever.

Spending time away like that gives you a renewed perspective. I wouldn’t say that I feel more “centered” now, but getting out in the wilderness certainly made me see the daily grind here in Provo a little differently. It’s so easy to get caught up in a routine, where the weeks and months go by until suddenly it’s summer again and you don’t know where the last year went. Unless you take the time to step back, you can never get perspective.

Unfortunately, in order to save up for Worldcon this August, I’m going to need to work 40 hours per week almost right up to the convention weekend itself. I’m not complaining; I feel blessed to have a steady source of income right now, especially in this economy. But as a writer, it’s hard when your job takes so much time and energy away from your writing time.

Lately, I’ve only been spending two or three hours a day writing, and a lot of that time is filled with interruptions. Part of it is just procrastination, but another part is that my day is so split up that the only periods of unbroken free time are from 9 pm to 8 am. That’s tough, because I need a big chunk of writing time to do my best work.

Even though I’ve been making decent progress on Desert Stars, I feel like I could be doing so much more. If I could take a week off for a retreat where I did nothing but focused on my writing, I could probably finish this draft in a matter of days, with time to start a bunch of new projects. In fact, I already have about a half dozen stories in embryo, with scenes and characters just begging to be written. Once this latest project is finished, I don’t quite know what I’ll be starting next.

Since I should be writing right now instead of posting to this blog, I’ll wrap up by saying that I really wish I could take some time off for another retreat, this time to focus solely on my writing. But since I can’t, I’ll do my best to carve away large periods of unbroken time for writing, and unplugging myself from distractions both online and off in order to make the most of it.

It’s a difficult balance, one that’s a constant struggle to maintain. Right now, I feel like I’m on the losing side of the battle, which means it’s time for a change of routine. Thankfully, taking some time off in the wilderness has helped me to better see what I need to do. I only hope I can maintain that perspective in order to break out of this stifling routine.

<sigh> One of these days, when writing is my primary source of income, this will not be nearly so difficult of a problem. You have no idea how much I want to make that happen. In the meantime, back to work.

…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 >>

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.

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!