May News and Progress! With Cake

May has ended, and what a tumultuous sort of month it was, too. On the inside of my head, not so much the outside. But let’s discuss!

Writing

We had first (and obviously), the Alysha novel launch for Faith in the Service. That’s my third new novel for the year, and I am on schedule so far to make my six-book-a-year target (and not really sweating either). I didn’t think this would be an issue once I was working full time at this, and it’s not, so… yay!

Second, I finished the serialization of Kherishdar’s Exception (and wasn’t that a roller coaster). My editing/polishing pass is also done… the only thing I have left is proofreading and tweaking. (If you’d like to help with proofreading/typo-hunting, do tell me and I’ll add you to the document share). KH4 is my July release, and I set aside all of June for editing, formatting, and rebranding for the series, so I’m right on schedule. *muscle flex*

Finally, I finished my re-read of Zafiil after sitting on it for a while, and then I meditated on it, and then I took several naps on it. I have come to no definite conclusion yet about whether I want to rescue it by rewriting it. What I have concluded, though, is that the Peltedverse timeline still needs ironing out, and to that end I’ve begun the collaborative Pelted Historical Society project, which I will discuss later in a (locked to patrons-only!) post. This will be an opportunity for you all to help me hunt down references to dates and ages and times in the existing canon, and in return you will get a cool sticker, and possibly a cameo in a future book. More on that later!

So, that was writing in May, which is to say I spent most of it editing. I did not love that, but I am really proud of the results so, net good. Onward.

Art

My art output continues to be higher than it was before my husband and I redid my desk to be appropriate only for art. This is excellent, and exactly what I wanted. I did a lot of art in May. Some of it was serving something directly: I drew in all the books for the Morgan Kickstarter, and painted the five conlang bookmarks for that project (two of them seen above there, on my desk), plus I drew in the “launch day” editions of Faith for my Etsy store.

I also did a lot of sketching for the serial while working in the conlang notebooks I mentioned in last month’s update, and I did an entire conlang painting, following the prompt from the novel, which involved carving alien words out of a painted ground with an exacto knife and wasn’t THAT exciting.

In addition, I now do a lot of drawings from Discord prompts, which is a lot of fun. A typical session usually involves me drawing five to fifteen pictures from things people suggest in the chat, and it’s often stuff I might not have done had I thought of it myself. We get everything from off-the-wall suggestions (‘cat unicorns’) to in-universe things (‘Maia and Uuvek staring at charts!’ ‘Jokka dancing!’) to jokes (‘Alysha reprising the Captain-Kirk-on-planet-fighting-the-Gorn role! With ripped shirt!’). I honest-to-goodness love your contributions. So best. <3

I also started one painting in May, which is taking me a bit of time because it’s fairly ambitious, which is a re-do of a picture I did of Alysha for the Midwest FurFest conbook in 2003? 2009? One of those two. I did it in Art Deco style, and I wanted to have a go at that again, using Erte as a style guide. Should be fun!

Audio/Video

I am still getting myself together, audio/video-wise, but I did some twitch streaming last month, plus I figured out how to clean up my audio recordings’ noise floors… which has made a huge difference in their quality. To my ears, anyway. I am moving on to solving the next challenges that are preventing me from moving into this arena. *rolls sleeves up*

But in addition to my personal audio/video adventures, the last of the Morgan audiobooks made it to bandcamp, retail, (and libraries), and I am actively pursuing getting each of my existing audiobooks off Audible’s exclusive contract as they come off it. (The Aphorisms and The Admonishments are up this summer, so they’re next.) When I pry them loose, they’ll go up on Bandcamp, and out via Findaway to international venues and libraries, and I’ll have the ability to run sales on them, and add bonus content to my “author editions.” (I am particularly excited about bonus content for the Kherishdar books, because now I can actually share with you what the language sounds like in my bonus tracks.)

Crowdfunding/Sales

Finally, a couple of notes here in the crowdfunding/sales department. In May I finished up the last of the Kickstarter stuff and sent it off. I also had a couple of e-book promotions: an author-advertised one for “Second” to coincide with the release of Faith, and an international-only Bookbub for Mindtouch. And I ran my first audiobook promo for Heir via Chirp, which had great results. I moved more audiobooks in May through that promo than I have through Audible in entire seasons. I super super love being able to do sales for my audiobooks. Price control is so exciting. I’ve always hated ACX taking the pricing decisions out of your hands. (Now I don’t have to hate it anymore, because I have Findaway).

This is also the section where I say proudly that our Discord server is now Level 1-boosted, which means we have room for EVEN MORE BLOOD SPATTER EMOJIS. (And mango and hug emojis. It’s not all cartoon violence, promise.) This is also the section where I remind you that you’re awesome and I am grateful for your support, here and on Discord. I have the best community. <3

(If you haven't joined us on Discord, please consider doing so!)

Upcoming

While my schedule for the remainder of the year isn’t set in concrete, it’s a lot less nebulous than it was last month. I’ve been feeling for a while that I’ve hit a revenue plateau, and not really happy about it, and naturally doing the same of what I’ve always been doing is just going to get me more of the same of what I’ve got. So I am about this close (*makes little pinched gesture*) to throwing over my conservative plans and going for the big shake-up. Granted that, here’s my plan:

• Launch Kherishdar’s Exception as planned as the July release.
• Finish a second Alysha novel this year (because I’ve already started it and Alysha’s books aren’t taxing to write while still giving good return on investment. Plus, they’re fun).
• Finish my Jokka short story to fulfill my “more Jokka stories” promise to readers, and
• Toss everything else aside to finish the last three books of Coracle and debut them together when they’re done.

As “do something completely different” plans go, “finish the deist Middle Grade series under your childrens’ book pen name” is pretty completely different, and I can see a lot of interesting paths forking from this decision that will open up my options.

I am still planning on running two more Kickstarters this year, but now I haven’t decided when. You’ll be the first to know, though!

(The cake was not a lie. It is, however, virtual.)

So that was May, and the future plans. I feel pretty good about where I’m going now! And as usual, I love to hear from you, so if you have comments, suggestions, or just want to flail I’m here to eat popcorn and beam at you. Okay, no seriously, I am here to listen. I’ll share the popcorn. :D