WIP Taking Shape

The Daedalus Enigma is coming along nicely. I’ve gotten 11 chapters typed and am at a 93 page count, just shy of 30k words.

I’ve also done some research toward my Sekrit Projekt.

Progress Report

While I didn’t get much authorly work done during the week thanks to night shift week and overtime, I think I made up for it this weekend. The Word document of The Daedalus Enigma is now 60 pages long (following Smashwords guidelines/formatting) and includes the Once Upon a Tide prologue and the first 6 chapters.

Episode 3 of The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe is currently out to my beta readers. Episode 4 is typed up and awaiting its turn. Of course, while I’m typing up Daedalus, further episodes of Pigg & Woolfe will have to await my attention.

I also need to do a bit of research on the works of a few of my fellow panelists at LibertyCon for the pirate panel I’m moderating. Have to come up with good ways to give them openings to pimp their books, after all.

that is all

Busy Busy Busy

I have been busy and marginally productive over the past week. Partly due to a nice chunk of overtime at work, but also where my writing is concerned.

I have done my first round of revisions on the Lovecraftian horror short story Lake Effect and hope to have it ready to submit to the editor at Iron Clad Press soon. Hopefully it will make the cut for the anthology The Nameless. I still need to figure out how to cut about 500 words to meet the 10,000 word maximum without sacrificing the story.

I began typing and making initial revisions to The Daedalus Enigma yesterday. I have gotten the Once Upon a Tide and the first two chapters completed so far; 25 pages. I’m still trying to decide whether to use the Once Upon a Tide vignette or chapter 1 as my reading selection at LibertyCon.

Speaking of LibertyCon, the convention schedule is now live on their website (subject to change right up to the convention weekend, of course). 154 pros attending and so much programming they’re pushing the start time up to 1:00 pm on Friday, July 8. This is the first time they’ve started any earlier than 3:00 pm Friday.

My personal schedule for the con is happily busy:

Friday, July 8

1pm Authors’ Alley (in the Dealer room lobby) along with my friends Rocky Perry , M.B. Weston, and Dave Schroeder.

5pm Opening Ceremonies (in the Centennial Theater) where everyone gets introduced, and if they don’t stand when their name is called, it is assumed they are “at the bar.” (Blame that one on the Baen Barflies.)

Saturday, July 9

1pm Autograph Session (in the Dealer room) along with Brett Brooks and Michael Lackey.

2pm Reading (in Gallery B) shared with Dave Schroeder. We both get a half hour.

8pm Panel “It’s In the Blood: What Fuels Our Fears, Attraction, and Fascination With Vampires” (in the Centennial Theater foyer) along with Brett Brooks, Declan Finn, Becky Kyle, Terry Maggert, and moderated by Karen Bogen.

10pm Authors’ Alley (in the Dealer room lobby) along with Brett Brooks, Sevan Paris, and Rocky Perry.

Sunday, July 10

10am Kaffeeklatsche (in the Roosevelt Room) along with every attending pro who isn’t too hung over from the Saturday night room parties to be up that early on a convention weekend Sunday. It’s a chance for con goers to mingle and mix with the pros… and have coffee.

12pm Authors’ Alley (in the Dealer room lobby) along with Brett Brooks, David L. Burkhead, and David B. Coe aka D.B. Jackson.

2pm Panel “What’s New In the World of Pirate Fantasy” (in the Centennial Theater foyer) along with Jack Finley, Rich Groller, and Rocky Perry. I got pegged to moderate this one by our program director, Rich.

I don’t know how many, if any memberships are still available. LibertyCon strictly limits attendance to 750, and they were only around 30 or so tickets left last time I heard/saw anything about it. If you want to enjoy a family-friendly convention with one of the highest pros to attendees ratios with authors, artists, scientists of every stripe, gamers, and cosplayers in abundance, I suggest you ACT NOW. (The Chattanooga Choo Choo, which hosts the convention, is sadly fully booked, but there are overflow hotels available.)

Q & A Wrap-up

Well, my Question and Answer sessions were mildly successful. They were attended, just not as greatly as I’d hoped. I think holding them on a holiday weekend probably played into that.

As promised, here are transcripts of the questions asked, and my replies. Screen names or first names only are used to protect participants privacy. I’ve arranged the questions according to topic rather than chronological order or forum asked on. (One was on Plurk, the other on Facebook.)

Feel free to ask me questions about the books or characters. Feel free to ask the characters questions. Be prepared for spoilers if you haven’t read any or all of the books yet.

 

Manateehugs: Oooh yay Q&A! This is more of a business-y type question. How is the experience of selling your book at Conventions? I love the energy at cons and artists alleys so I have a fantasy of doing like wise, but I was wondering if you could give me some pointers and or insight.

I admit I wish my sales were better. But considering I can only afford to attend the same 3 cons every year (because they’re all in town), my expectations aren’t high.

Still, I do make some sales each con, occasionally of more than the first title in the series. Don’t judge how it will go by me, though. J B Garner just finished a con this weekend and had what I consider stellar sales. 27 books!

Price figures in, too. I have a publisher, so there is only so much wiggle room for discounts, unlike self-pubbed authors. I have to pay 60% of the cover price for every physical book I order, which means I can’t afford to sell them for $10 each (cover price is $15.99). I wouldn’t even make enough to cover shipping.

One thing I’d like to do for my next con is get some proper banners. It will make my table look more professional.

It also helps to be outgoing… or as one of my author/musician friends says: Be a shameless attention whore. Don’t be afraid to STOP people walking by your table. Compliment their cosplay, if they’re doing that.

Manateehugs: Thank-you my friend that is really helpful!

Implore them to give a poor book a good home. Put something shiny and eye-catching on your table. (I give away Mardi Gras beads, glass fish tank jewels, and plastic coins.) Some authors put a candy bowl out.

Cards and bookmarks with your website on them are VITAL, especially if you do ebooks, too or people have limited funds, so they can look up info and purchase links to order the books later.

Manateehugs:I keep pondering if there is a way one could sell an e-copy of one’s book, say if it were on Amazon.

The only way to confirm a sale of an ebook is if the person has their reader with them and downloads it in front of you. I’ve only had this happen one time. It was during a panel at Chattacon this past January. The woman bought my 1st book and a book from the other two authors on the panel.

Manateehugs: Oh okay that makes sense. It’s a shame one can’t do like a redeemable card specifically for one’s ebook.

I haven’t tried that.

Of course, Amazon’s ebook return policy means there is the possibility of never seeing a royalty payment on a Kindle sale. Too many out there won’t hesitate to buy an ebook, read the whole thing, then return it before the quarter is up, which means no royalty, even though they read the whole book.

Karen: Describe how you come up with ideas: I.e., plot, characters, setting, for example.

My husband and I hashed out the bare bones of the seven-book story arc back in 2006, when it was still in the early stages. Before I start each manuscript, I’ll write out several pages of plot points which cover the main plot for that book and the sub-plots which run through the series. These do NOT always get followed strictly. The first book was entirely pantsed. All I knew was my basic formula. As the story progressed through the books, I was better able to plot ahead; but I often have cases of characters introducing themselves unplanned or established characters not following directions. Usually, this works out better than hoped.

Karen: Thanks!

Some of my inspiration in the early books came from articles in National Geographic or Smithsonian Magazine. Usually, this was when I was trying to decide where to stage the story, or elements to include in connection to a book’s Sister of Power. (Each book deals with a separate one, hence a seven-book arc.)

I made a point to research piracy and areas the story takes place in before beginning to write. Have to know what the rules are before you can break them, after all.

Karen: Haha, good point.

As a writer, I’m always intrigued by methods & schedules other writers use. How does a typical week of writing or revising/editing go for you?

Most of my writing has been done during work breaks over the years. There always seems to be too many distractions at home (cats, husband) to get good writing concentration. Lately, I’ve been frustrated and not getting as much writing done during my lunch break. I have a coworker who has gravitated to the table I use and feels the need to fill the silence with constant inane chatter. Kristina knows who I’m referring to. I keep telling myself I won’t get sucked in and will just ignore them, but it’s like not being able to log out of FB when you want to. Luckily (or un, depending on your POV) I got a good deal of writing done during time off for a recent med procedure.

I CAN make myself focus on typing up MSs and revising them, when I need to, though. (I do all my first drafts by hand in composition books; after all, you don’t have to worry about anyone stealing one of THOSE like you would a tablet or laptop.)

Just Sunday (May 30), I made myself stay offline until I got the MS of a horror short story unrelated to this series typed up and gone through one revision. I still need to figure out how to trim another 500 words off it, though, to meet the min-max word count requirements for the publisher it’s slated for.

Manateehugs: Vik definitely has the morality of a pirate of his time, has that ever been emotionally hard for you to write?

Actually, no. What has been hardest for me to write with him has been the first part of book 7. He’s a bit depressed and mourning the loss of a very important person to him. Getting in that mindset has been rough.

Manateehugs: I understand the roughness of writing the depression part. I have a really hard time sticking with a narrative if the character has lost their fighting spirit and there seems to be no end of the depression in sight.

^^this

I think he’s coming out of it some. He’s still putting off finishing his quest. Juma holds a special, unreasoning dread for him, another emotion he is completely unfamiliar with dealing with.

Kristina: Belladonna is so far one of my favorite characters. When you write about her do you identify with her? To me she seems like this beautifully scary, feminine (in human form) yet sexually lethal creature.

That pretty much pegs how I see Belladonna. She’s very fun to write. I do get into her head space, but she would be viewed as borderline sociopathic by an analyst. Since she’s not human, she doesn’t always fully understand WHY humans react the way they do to some situations. She doesn’t really feel remorse and only understands it academically. She is several thousand years old, despite her youthful appearance, so she knows her prey very well and can almost seamlessly mimic humans.

She does feed on sexual energy as well as living flesh. I still remember some of the guys [at work] saying they wouldn’t hesitate to “hit that” when I showed them a drawing of her true form, even after I explained she would literally EAT them for food.

So, if she were real rather than a figment of my imagination, she definitely wouldn’t go hungry.

 

Kristina: Does Jim Rigger/ Lazarus regret being turned? Or is the power and connection reward in itself?

Does Jim regret being turned… not really. I first addressed that in Demon Bayou.

(spoiler ahead, since I know you haven’t gotten that far in the series yet)

 Jim was fiercely loyal to Viktor ever since they first teamed up in their teens. He knows how valuable he is to Vik as Lazarus. He’s given the choice to regain and retain human form as a vampire or continue as Lazarus. He chooses to remain Lazarus.

A spoiler/tease for all my readers: There will be a major event involving Jim/Lazarus in book six, The Daedalus Enigma, due later this year.

Kristina: Do people in your day to day life often inspire your characters?

Not really, with the exception of the one’s who’ve won or earned “red shirt” status. Even those are usually minor characters I’d already written with my victim’s name pasted on… with permission, of course. For anyone wondering what I mean by “red shirt”; they are characters who meet an untimely or horrible demise. I’ve gotten rid of a few coworkers this way in the past.

All of my main characters and secondary characters were initially created years ago when I first started planning and researching for the series.

I will admit benefitting from watching the interactions of my male coworkers to get a better feel for how the pirate crew interacts. Of course, I was already writing the first draft of the third book in the series by that time.

And, this concluded all the questions and answers.