First Newsletter of 2021

Happy new year, patrons!

Before I begin this newsletter, I wanna thank everyone who joined me on my livestream last night. I had so much fun that I extended the stream to two hours instead of one. I hope you all had fun too.

There's gonna be a few changes to how I do things this year, and I wanted to let you all know what you can expect from now on.

Slowing Down:

I published 14 books in 2020. That's a lot. And I often felt like I was rushing to get my books out, which caused me to make a lot of mistakes I might have been able to avoid if I took my time. This year, I plan to publish less books so I can avoid making mistakes during the publishing process. This includes taking more time to make sure my manuscripts are as clean and free of errors as humanly possible. I want my books to have the same quality as traditionally published books - or as close as my indie author's budget can make them.

What This Means for Patreon:

This doesn't actually mean much for Patreon outside of this - Yuki-Onna and above patrons will get access to my novels at least one month before publication. It could be even longer depending on how long it takes to have my books edited, proofread, and illustrated. You might be reading my books as early as 4-5 months in advance.

Here is my Plan:

In keeping with the spirit of self-improvement, I plan to have a survey after I finish posting all the chapters for a story. The survey will have a series of questions like "Were there places you were bored and/or confused by the story?" and "What do you think about the characters? Who is your favorite/least favorite and why?" These questions are here to help me know what you like, what you didn't like, whether there were any inconsistencies in the story, and so on. 

Before I continue, I want you all to know these surveys are optional. If you just want to read my story, that's okay. However, if you'd like to help me improve my stories, please feel free to write your opinions in each survey.

Can I Let You Know When Your Story has Mistakes?

Of course you can. I'm never against someone telling me that my book's got errors in it. Feel free to point out any that you find in the comment section of each chapter. If you want to make sure I know what section you are talking about, you can even write something like this:

"Eryk seemed larger then life." Should be: "Eryk seemed larger THAN life."

New Beta Channel:

I've got a new channel on my Discord called Beta Readers. This is an invite only channel for Yuki-Onna and above Patrons. In this channel, you can all talk about my books amongst each other. What did you like? What didn't you like? Feel free to say whatever you want, even if it's to complain about how the author is a complete hack and needs to git gud. This is a channel for you.

If you want access to this channel, just comment on this post saying "I want in!"

Speaking of Discord, I've Made Some Changes:

I have made a number of changes to Brandon's Sci-Fi & Fantasy Discord. The first thing you'll notice is there are a lot more channels, but I've also got several groups. There are general channels for chatting, author hangout channels to talk shop and trade writing tips, channels to discuss various books and genres and recommend your favorite series to others, and places to discuss my books. Of course, I also have a Japanese section because I'm a weeb.

My Discord is probably gonna be always evolving as I continue working on improving it. If any of you have a specific channel you want, let me know. Want a channel for DnD? Tell me and I'll make you admin of that channel. Want a channel for NSFW roleplay? Tell me. I'll give you your own channel. Is NSFW not enough? Need some S&M? I'll give you a channel for your sadism needs. You just need to let me know what you want.

If you are connected to my Discord through Patreon, you should be able to access the #spoiler channel. This is the area where you can talk about spoilers to my books. Since this is a channel for all my patrons, please keep spoilers to WIEDERGEBURT since Human patrons also have access to it. Please use the #beta-reader channel to discuss spoilers of my other books.

Livestreams:

Last night, I had my first livestream, and it was a lot of fun. However, I didn't realize Discord doesn't do one-way video streaming like Twitch. While I had a blast conversing with the people who joined, I realize not everyone is comfortable talking on the internet. I want to do more livestreams, but I think I'm gonna use Twitch so everyone who wants to interact with me can do so safely.

I actually have a Twitch channel called bvarnell69, which I haven't used yet. And don't think I can't see you rolling your eyes at me. 69 is a great number. It's my favorite, so of course I'm gonna use it in my name.

Anyway, my tentative goal right now is to do at least one livestream a month. I say tentative because I'm honestly very shy even if I don't seem like it sometimes. But I'd like to connect with all of you more, and I think this would be a great way to do it.

On that note, I do wonder what I should do during these streams. I'm really not sure what kinda things I can talk about since talking in general is not my forte. If you have any ideas on what you'd like me to discuss, please tell me here.

Anyway, this is all I've got. I think this newsletter is a lot bigger than normal, but that's the new year for you.

Before I leave, please let me thank all of you for supporting me here. Words alone cannot express my appreciation for you. You're all awesome.

Happy 2021.