*This is Sarah: yeah, I know you all know Witchfinder is out and those of you who read fantasy and can afford it have read it. So I’m not going to push it at you, because I PRESUME you’re not stupid — I’m just going to ask if you have a blog or a face book page and you ENJOYED Witchfinder (I’m not asking you to lie and say you liked it or push it if you haven’t read it.) would you post about it, with the link from the side of the blog and do a little promo? I get sales every time I put it on my FB, but it feels like I’m being a bore saying “Hi people. Here’s my book. Buy it.” Just echoing someone who posted and liked it makes it less “Hi, have you seen this?”
Now let me explain why — it’s sold pretty well, but since tax day everyone’s sales have been sucky and mine are no exception. They haven’t stopped — and I do realize 6.99 is high for an indie book, yes, but it’s a massive fat fantasy. It will come down when it’s been out a year, which seems to be what authors do. And I’m not going to tell you I need it to eat — I don’t. We’re going to be a bit tight, meaning nothing special and no impromptu trips to the diner, and no big expenses if we can help it (some of it we can’t. We have to do a lot of fix-up and dress up on the house before it goes up) till the house sells and that could be a year or so which means we might or might not make it to Liberty con this year (and if we do it will probably just be Dan and I unless the boys are willing to pay for it out of their own money. It can’t be just me, because I’ll get lost.) And I might not make it to Portugal, which is a little worse because Mom seems incapable of understanding “can’t afford it” and seems to think I’m being mean and/or trying to get her to pay for it. (I’m not. In fact I turned down her offer to “help” — I know what the downturn has done to their savings — about what it did to all of us.)
But that’s not the issue. The thing is this book is a proof of concept. I’ve said before, and I’ll say till the end of time, I’ll keep writing for Baen, the shifters and DST and probably/maybe the world war I dragon thing. And maybe other stuff that comes up. And there you have it. I’ll necessarily be writing a lot of these on spec. Which dovetails strangely with how my mind works.
I’ve discovered my writing works weirdly. It often requires me to write two or three novels at once, just to get one to flow. This is because I don’t think rationally about writing. It’s all from the subconscious. I can shape it in rewrite or shape it as it flows, but the PRIMAL push and work has to come out on its own.
This is the issue, btw, with being under contract, because when I am, I feel I owe money, and the moralizer in the back of my brain won’t let me write anything that’s NOT under contract. Because I’m in debt, you know. And so I’ll block and write a 100 words in a month. Then I get furious at myself… This is why writing for other houses actually helped me write faster for Baen, because if they were all under contract I could “rotate.” It wasn’t ideal. The books I was rotating to weren’t necessarily something I needed or even wanted to do. For instance, when I knew they were dropping musketeers on the floor, I blocked hard on the fifth book. And yet, it still helped.
Anyway, the point is that even just to work for Baen (I think after this I’ll do it without contract) I need to know there’s a place to put the other books, and that means I need to feel indie is worth my time. Not perhaps on the same level as traditional (well, not up front, though I’ve now made ALMOST as much as I used to get from mystery advances) but not a waste of time, because then the moralist will insist that I’d be better of making the house REALLY clean and the writing stops.
So, it’s important that Witchfinder convince the idiot at the back of my head that indie books CAN work. And then maybe I can come to a working agreement with it.
So, if you can say anything nice (obviously saying something not-nice won’t work) that I can echo or link and give the thing a little push, it might help you get more free (and otherwise) books in the future.
No pressure of course. Do it only if you’re okay with it. And now I’ll get out of the way of the Clam who’s got promo.*
Greeting, mammals! Just a couple of entries this week, so go and support your fellow Huns. Don’t forget to leave reviews! As always, future entries can (and should!) be sent to my email. Happy reading!
Jason Dyck, AKA The Free Range Oyster
Bug Hunter , Mercenary Wordsmith, and Producer of Pearlescent Puns
William Lehman
Harvest Of Evil
In much of the world, Lycanthropy or Vampirism is still a death sentence if you are caught; however, as a result of the Civil Rights movements of the 1950’s and ’60’s, it’s legal in the US, Canada, and several other European commonwealth countries. Magic and other metaphysical abilities are more accepted in much of the world, but figuring out what is legal and what is not, requires a lawyer and a half dozen research assistants. Of course, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. Doing heavy duty magic takes a LOT of energy, staying in animal form too long, can cause you to get “stuck”, and vampires go through a lot of blood, plus that whole daylight thing… In the US though, ‘Thropes, as they’re known, and vampires have “gone mainstream” and come out of the kennel and the coffin. Were they were promptly recruited by the military. Of course both types had been serving before, it was just kept quiet, now it’s out in the open… And what does a Retired Were cougar do when he hangs up his uniform for the last time? He becomes a Park Ranger of course… John Fisher had been having a normal day at the office… That is if your office is a Federal Park police Durango, and you were a retired SEAL from the infamous “SEAL team 12” who’s members were all some form of Preternatural. But then things got REALLY weird.
Cyn Bagley
In the Shadow of Death: Reflections on a Chronic Illness
In January 2003 I spent two weeks in a German hospital before I was diagnosed with Wegener’s Granulomatosis. This collection contains my journey through a chronic illness. This ebook was written as remembrance for Vasculitis month (May) and to all of those people who have lived with and died from a chronic illness.
Also available from these other fine booksellers:
According To Hoyt 
The idiot at the back of your head is right, indie books CAN’T work. Just look at the spectacular career tanking that happened with Larry “Evil is my middle name” Correia, that Meyers tramp with her twinklie vamps and whassername what wrote those 50 Shades of Ewww books. Just ask ANY big name publisher (and many small publishers): in order for the public to buy a book it MUST be properly presented, with all of the editorial guidance that ONLY professionally trained and developed staff can provide.
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I DID say it’s an idiot, right?
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Lessons in Etiquette (Schooled in Magic 02) by Christopher Nuttall just came out in Kindle store.
I’ve enjoyed Chris’ work and this series. [Smile]
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Note to William Lehman: interesting concept, sounds like a lot of fun, but I recommend you rethink your cover art. I think the “cartoony” quality conveys the wrong impression.
Yeah, easy to criticize, hard to come up with better — I can’t draw worth a hoot myself but I’ve bought a lot of books in my day and your cover doesn’t convey the type of story that your blurb suggests.
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I advise Filter Forge and playing with the “creative” filters. You can usually find a photo you want, but just outlining it in marker doesn’t make it “drawn.” Filter Forge was used on the central figure of Witchfinder (the background is a Victorian painting) which was obtained from Dreamstime and is an Eastern European gentleman in fancy dress. I.e. a photograph. To blend it with the painting, I used Filter Forge. Took a lot of experimenting, but it’s doable. Give it a try.
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I’d buy it… but I read paper so slowly these days, I really only want fun-reads in ebook. There, two nags for one! I also think the cover needs work.
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On further contemplation, I think the running pose is unnecessary as a means of conveying action — the burning forest serves very well to do that. Using Sarah’s excellent Rogue Magic cover as a reference, imagine that man in ranger tunic & hat, with his face slightly altered — snout/muzzle instead of nose/mouth, tufted ears, dense short golden fur instead of beard, very human eyes set in a cat’s brow, with slit pupils, lips parted in a slight smile showing just a hint of feline dentition.
The books concept is great — I imagine the Americans with Disabilities Act further opened the door for lycanthropes and vampires: “It’s a disease, man; I didn’t choose to be this way. Its illegal for you to discriminate against me!”
I guess Smokey the Bear was actually a were?
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Three for free! Please put that up in ebook. Not that much more time, if you have the print file in something other than pdf, and better sales for sure.
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If that blurb is on the Amazon page, it needs some pretty serious copy-editing or it is going to turn away a lot of potential readers. And if the book is the same way, there will be some grammar nazi reviewers who will slam it just for kicks.
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*Glowers at Sarah* Do not joke about missing Libertycon. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for months. And if I have to hire a squad of ninjas to kidnap you (don’t worry, they serve excellent sushi during transport) I WILL. You can only push a Mad Scientist so far before it’s all Death Rays and tears before bedtime.
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Sigh. there’s a lot of people there I’d like to meet. BUT if there’s not enough money, we won’t. Mostly, taxes wiped us out.
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*taps fingers together Vetinari – style*
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Sarah I don’t know if you are aware but every year I fly to a convention almost free. Each year I get an airline credit card for the miles use it enough to earn the 30-40 thousands air miles and then cancel it a month or so before it’s renew time. Otherwise I don’t use that card I use my Amazon cc. This year I’m getting 40,000 from American Airlines the second time I’ve had a card with them. I’ve also done Delta and United credit cards. With a yearly income of $15,000+ this makes going to 2 cons a year a lot easier.
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Yes, Tom — we’re NOT doing that. Period.
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OK.
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Sarah, do not fear I gave you a 5 star on Amazon review. Short but to the point.
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I’ll get a review up on my website this coming week. I JUST got through the last of the edit checks on NonFic1 a few minutes ago, and I need to look at them one more time before I can do anything creative. (Thank G-d for pre-written blog posts.)
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I wondered why I hadn’t got a guest post from you in ages!
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Yeah. The last few weeks have been, eh, I’ll just say intense. As Borepatch says, life’s been “using its outside voice” for me and a number of other people, and I’ve been trying to help out, plus getting the revision/edits checked, and a few other little things.
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Clearly we fans of Indy need to convince the back of your brain that we who read your Indy published stuff _demand_ at least two books a year, and it had better get cracking, what with competing with Baen contracts to ramp up your stress.
There. Did that give Elf Blood enough status to work in the rotation?
I sympathize. I also have many works in progress, at any given time.
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Thanks again for putting this one up– Those of us with this disease put up a concerted effort to get the word out in May. It is a rare disease, but in the last eleven years I have seen the numbers for diagnosis drop from 1 in 100,000 to 1 in 30,000. So thank you– the range for this disease used to be around 41. We are now seeing this disease in children as young as three. The oldest person I saw with the disease was 82. Thank you again– Sarah and freeoyster
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Yea– get it out before I am in the poor house. *sigh so I can buy it.
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Sarah, I’m almost done with Witchfinder and will do an Amazon review and, because I’m determined to figure out how, one on Goodreads. (I love it, btw). I’ll drop you a line with the link to the latter, probably by the end of the week.
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I don’t post amazon reviews on FB, but if you have one on good reads, I totally can ;)
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Cool. I can do this. I know I can.
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Goodreads isn’t hard. I usually cross-post to GR and Amazon when I do a blog review. Which I’m not sure I have done on Witchfinder. I’ll check in the morning, I need to go fall over now.
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Hi folks, it’s out in Ebook through Amazon this weekend. Yes, the cover is not what I might have wanted, if oh say Baen was doing the book… But with a smaller publishing house, you take what you can get. Ironically I’ve had almost as many people say they love the cover as hate it. The picture didn’t come through well in this format, the forest isn’t burning, it’s just autumn. No, Smoky was just a bear, but there are some bear were’s you’ll meet one or two in the second book.
And, Sara, Thanks for the mention.
William Lehman
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