Step One: Stand Up
Jan. 15th, 2015 01:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lydamorehouse As you know, Bob, I'm attempting to get myself back on track this year.
The reason you haven't heard from me in the last few days is because I've been revising (maybe even, one could say "reshaping") the web serial that Rachel Gold/Calish and I wrote called "School for Wayward Demons" into book form. We're planning on having it available for MarsCON 2015, where I will be a guest of honor. If I dare say so? After all that work (and knowing that it's not even done yet, that Rachel will be going over it again), I think it's pretty damn good.
I'm little nervous about next steps. We're talking about doing a Kickstarter for this series--something I've thought about a lot, but never dared. We're only just sitting down to figure out how we might do that, because... well, because it's a big undertaking. Do we ask people to fund the production of this book in its print form? Do we ask people to fund the next book(s) and use this one as a premium? Both? Something else entirely?
If any of you out there have Kickstarter/Indigogo experience, advice, or even just strident opinions, please let me know. You can comment here, or email me (lyda.morehouse@gmail.com). Rachel and I are meeting tomorrow, but we'll be gathering information for a little while, for sure.
I'll frank, too, the nervous part has to do with how much I worry that Kickstarters and Indigogo things are popularity contests to some extent, and the nerd in me fears that the only award I'd get in such a contest would be "least likely to succeed." This fear of mine is currently being feed by the fact that I failed to reach critical mass for my Loft Fan Fiction class. Now I have theories about why that class didn't go and at least one of them falls squarely on Rachel and my shoulders. The title and the description were a little bland, not very snappy. We were trying to figure out how to appeal to the type of Loft student who can afford in-house classes and, in doing that, I think we went a little broad. If we were to offer this in the future, I think we shouldn't bother with that imaginary student and just try to hook the friendly neighborhood geek. We pushed the class as kind of the: so you want to do that 50 Shades of Gray thing and turn your fic into pro work, eh? angle.
The only problem with just embracing the geek is that I think the Loft's prices are a big stumbling block for a lot of people. (They would be for me. Frankly, I just signed up for 8 weeks Japanese Intermediate at Community Ed. and I nearly baulked at the 60 bucks. The Loft charges $300 or more for 6 weeks.)
So maybe the lesson here (and for the Kickstarter?) might be: scale costs to your audience.
We'll have to see. I'm a big proponent of the impulse buy, which is why I talked my editor/publisher at Wizard's Tower Press into such low costs for my e-books. In my case (and which will be the case with School for Wayward Demons) a lot of people already owned my books. With School... a lot of content is on-line and free. The book is significantly deeper and, in a few cases, different, but we're going to have to be sure to keep that in mind when we think about how we're going about this.
I don't know.
It's going to be interesting, if nothing else.
Meanwhile, did I say I signed up for Intermediate Japanese? I'm so psyched! It's going to be a blast (I hope.) Same teacher: Tetsuya-sensei, whom I really grew to love, so that will be good. I've been supplementing in the meantime by listening to JapanPod101.com. All that really means is that I now remember how to introduce myself to someone for the first time! (The most basic thing ever. Still. I am practicing, which is IMPORTANT.)
Also, I should do a blog post tomorrow about all my reading. I finished MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest. I also got tapped to read and blurb a book by a new author who seems to be writing New Adult SF Dystopia--though I can't really say for sure, because so far, I only opened up the document long enough to make sure it came through all right. I'm going to try to read through that this weekend, and then start up on the second of the Philip K. Dick award nominees, BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan.
At the library on Tuesday night, I noticed that Arden Hills had the third Hawkeye collection: HAWKEYE: L.A. WOMAN (Fraction/Wu, Pulido). This one seems to follow Kate Bishop (aka Hawkeye--yes, folks, there are two) when she gets fed up with Clint and goes to Los Angeles. She apparently takes the Dog, who is, BY FAR, the fan favorite if fic requests during Yuletide are any indication.
So that's me. You?
Also, Wyrdsmiths has a new member, Theo Lorenz.
The reason you haven't heard from me in the last few days is because I've been revising (maybe even, one could say "reshaping") the web serial that Rachel Gold/Calish and I wrote called "School for Wayward Demons" into book form. We're planning on having it available for MarsCON 2015, where I will be a guest of honor. If I dare say so? After all that work (and knowing that it's not even done yet, that Rachel will be going over it again), I think it's pretty damn good.
I'm little nervous about next steps. We're talking about doing a Kickstarter for this series--something I've thought about a lot, but never dared. We're only just sitting down to figure out how we might do that, because... well, because it's a big undertaking. Do we ask people to fund the production of this book in its print form? Do we ask people to fund the next book(s) and use this one as a premium? Both? Something else entirely?
If any of you out there have Kickstarter/Indigogo experience, advice, or even just strident opinions, please let me know. You can comment here, or email me (lyda.morehouse@gmail.com). Rachel and I are meeting tomorrow, but we'll be gathering information for a little while, for sure.
I'll frank, too, the nervous part has to do with how much I worry that Kickstarters and Indigogo things are popularity contests to some extent, and the nerd in me fears that the only award I'd get in such a contest would be "least likely to succeed." This fear of mine is currently being feed by the fact that I failed to reach critical mass for my Loft Fan Fiction class. Now I have theories about why that class didn't go and at least one of them falls squarely on Rachel and my shoulders. The title and the description were a little bland, not very snappy. We were trying to figure out how to appeal to the type of Loft student who can afford in-house classes and, in doing that, I think we went a little broad. If we were to offer this in the future, I think we shouldn't bother with that imaginary student and just try to hook the friendly neighborhood geek. We pushed the class as kind of the: so you want to do that 50 Shades of Gray thing and turn your fic into pro work, eh? angle.
The only problem with just embracing the geek is that I think the Loft's prices are a big stumbling block for a lot of people. (They would be for me. Frankly, I just signed up for 8 weeks Japanese Intermediate at Community Ed. and I nearly baulked at the 60 bucks. The Loft charges $300 or more for 6 weeks.)
So maybe the lesson here (and for the Kickstarter?) might be: scale costs to your audience.
We'll have to see. I'm a big proponent of the impulse buy, which is why I talked my editor/publisher at Wizard's Tower Press into such low costs for my e-books. In my case (and which will be the case with School for Wayward Demons) a lot of people already owned my books. With School... a lot of content is on-line and free. The book is significantly deeper and, in a few cases, different, but we're going to have to be sure to keep that in mind when we think about how we're going about this.
I don't know.
It's going to be interesting, if nothing else.
Meanwhile, did I say I signed up for Intermediate Japanese? I'm so psyched! It's going to be a blast (I hope.) Same teacher: Tetsuya-sensei, whom I really grew to love, so that will be good. I've been supplementing in the meantime by listening to JapanPod101.com. All that really means is that I now remember how to introduce myself to someone for the first time! (The most basic thing ever. Still. I am practicing, which is IMPORTANT.)
Also, I should do a blog post tomorrow about all my reading. I finished MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest. I also got tapped to read and blurb a book by a new author who seems to be writing New Adult SF Dystopia--though I can't really say for sure, because so far, I only opened up the document long enough to make sure it came through all right. I'm going to try to read through that this weekend, and then start up on the second of the Philip K. Dick award nominees, BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan.
At the library on Tuesday night, I noticed that Arden Hills had the third Hawkeye collection: HAWKEYE: L.A. WOMAN (Fraction/Wu, Pulido). This one seems to follow Kate Bishop (aka Hawkeye--yes, folks, there are two) when she gets fed up with Clint and goes to Los Angeles. She apparently takes the Dog, who is, BY FAR, the fan favorite if fic requests during Yuletide are any indication.
So that's me. You?
Also, Wyrdsmiths has a new member, Theo Lorenz.