Updated news on Delvers LLC

This post is part blog, part confession, part discussion, and part marching orders addressed to myself.

_____

Okay everyone, I've listened to your opinions and figured out what I'm going to do.

As most of you have seen, I've already included another chapter for Delvers 4.  I believe this makes the books many, many times better because readers can intuit that Delvers 5 is going to be /nuts/.  

Also, at the end of Delvers 4, I'm going to inform readers that Delvers 5 is going to come out early next year.  This means I am not going to be taking a break from writing Delvers.

However, I will burn myself out if I write Delvers nonstop, so I am still going to writing and working on other stuff, but focus on Delvers LLC.

Right now my writing schedule priority will be:

Work on Delvers LLC>Work on Engineering Ludus>Work on SOO2>Work on Jake's Story

There will be a minimum of 2 new chapters of Delvers 5 up before Delvers LLC 4 launches.  Both chapters are about halfway written right now.  I will have named the 6th and 7th book by the end of this month.

In some ways, this is a nightmare scenario for me.  One reason I took so long coming back to Delvers is that I wanted to do a great job and I didn't want to let anyone down.  However, now I'm in this terrible position because of 2020 where business is taking priority over art, and I'm needing to make some really tough decisions.

All I can really do to mitigate this is just continue working my ass off.  I've been working 7 days a week, 13 hours a day on Delvers.  Keeping this pace up is not sustainable, but I'm planning to only dial it back to about 10 hours a day.

This next few months might make or break my career, at least unless I make a new pen name.

So my action item list for November right now looks something like:

-Write Delvers LLC 5
-Get Delvers 4 ready for publishing (this is going to take me a couple of days at least)
-Meet with Jeff Hays about Delvers 4 audio
-Wait for Andrea to be done with Asgard Awakening 2 audio, and pay her
-Get art ready for AA2 audio
-Prepare to submit AA2 audio to Amazon.  Hope it doesn't take 2 months for them to publish it
-Begin writing SOO2 (it's already outlined)
-Finish all the back end mechanics for SOO2 (I'm about 70% done)
-Promote Delvers LLC 4.  Create ads.  Pay for ads.
-Prepare and launch ads for Delvers LLC 4 launching
-Prepare and launch ads for AA2 audio launching
-Edit chapters of Engineering Ludus
-Keep working on Jake's Story, and wait for more word on a publishing deal
-Continue to grow/monitor 7 Facebook groups
-Remember to post at least 2 new blogs on my website to explain some of this WIP in more business-y, impersonal language
-Remember to send e-book versions of Delvers 4 to Patreon patrons when it launches
-Remember to order print copies of Delvers LLC 4 for patreon patrons, and send them with the other 2 books I owe my patrons
-(which reminds me) Contact my layout person to have Delvers LLC covers and print PDF files made for the print version
-Source art for Delvers 6 and Delvers 7
-Figure out titles for Delvers 6 and Delvers 7
-Source art for super secret art project

...all while trying to be a good husband and take care of myself.  Something's got to give, so I haven't been taking care of myself.  My wife made me promise that I would dial it back a little after Delvers 4 was done, so I'm going to try to work smarter, not harder.

If I seem a little testy or stressed, this is why.  If you own your own business and you're your own boss, this are going to be years that really grind you down.  This year has been my wtf year.  It's not really very comforting that lots of other people got screwed this year too--it kind of just makes me feel worse.  Believe me, I mean it when I've told everyone here that I really appreciate you sticking around.  

So the reality is that I'm not expecting Delvers LLC 4 to be super well received.  I think it'll be sort of like Delvers LLC 2 in that regard (which has a 4.4/5 rating).   It really, really sucks that I can't spend another extra month on the book...but I can't.  So my course of action is going to be to get the rest of the story out there ASAP so everyone knows they can still keep trusting me not to screw everything up.

Thank you for your feedback up until now.  Thank you for believing in me.

When Delvers LLC 4 comes out, please please please leave a review.  And sharing any Facebook posts you see about the launch will help me tremendously, too.

My last two launches have gotten amazing reviews, but sales have been super low.  2020 is just the year of suck for everyone.  I'm going to need everyone's help on getting the word out for Delvers 4.

But either way, I promise I will work hard not to let you guys down.

-BC