Fan's Choice

I’m not sure this is broadly known—in fact, after talking with a bunch of you, I know it’s not broadly known—but our $1000-a-month goal, which we reached a while ago, is “I can write one major niche project a year.” Looking at that now, I feel like the meaning is a bit opaque, so I’ll state it more clearly: as an author, I need to spend most of my time writing revenue-generating books if I want to continue eating. You don’t get a say in choosing those books (other than by buying them, or not!). I don’t, either! But if you look at my monthly sales numbers post, you can predict what I’ll be writing in the future. (“Books with Eldritch in them, and books like Dreamhealers, set in the Peltedverse.”)

That $1000+ a month goal means that I can do one fan-favorite a year that might make no money otherwise. And yes, you all get a say.

For this year (2018)’s niche project, I picked Kherishdar’s Exception because I noticed a lot of people mentioning that they wanted it. That was a pretty haphazard way to go about it, but we only hit the goal in late Q1 this year, so I didn’t really have a plan in place. Next year, in 2019, so long as we’re still over the goal, you all will get to vote on that extra project. I’ll pick three or four possibilities from the bucket of backburnered books, put them up, and let you decide!

Some answered questions:

What if we want short stories instead of a book? 

I’m not a huge short story writer; I don’t get ideas for them frequently, and when I do, they don’t often make sense outside their settings, or to new readers, which makes them impossible to sell as standalones to magazines. The major niche project needs to be something I can sell when I’m done, on the off-chance that it will make some extra money! So all these projects will be novella length or longer.

So no chance at shorter stories at all?

I like using short stories as incentives for Kickstarters, crowdfunding, and other kinds of gifts. You’ll have opportunities to ask for short fiction… it just won’t be as part of my Patreon “major niche project” initiative. And yes, those short stories will end up available at retail, eventually, as collections. The reason I don’t plan to do those is because collections never sell as well as novels (which don’t sell as well as novels in a series!).

What if we want a niche SERIES??

Unless the book you’re asking for can be consumed as a standalone, I’m not going to commit to niche series because of my long-standing internal decision to avoid unfinished, published stories. I don’t like leaving readers hanging in the middle of a series because I didn’t or couldn’t finish writing the entire arc. Your best bet, if you want an entire series, is to ask for something that stands alone as book 1, and then somehow get people to buy it in such numbers that I decide to keep going. :D

Is voting going to be weighted?

Yes. Not extremely… like, dollar for dollar or anything. But people who support at higher tiers will have slightly more say than people who are supporting at lower tiers. Don’t get discouraged though. Right now there’s only 200-odd of you, and that’s not really a ton of people to be making a single decision like this…!

Can we get more fan choices if your Patreon keeps getting more money?

There’s another “fan choice” at $3000 a month! Tell your friends! :D

(No, seriously, this post is public for a reason. Lol.)

Can you give us some clues about 2019’s choices??

Actually, unless something explodes, I already know what your 2019 choices are. (I should, right? There’s only four months left in 2018!) Here’s what you’re probably going to be voting between these (all titles are “mental tags” and not actual titles!):

• Alysha, Book 5, the Retreat Novel: Because Alysha isn’t selling as well as my other Peltedverse settings (yet), I still consider new books in her series ‘niche projects.’ Book 5 of the series takes place after Either Side of the Strand and involves Alysha attending her first psychiatrist-run “leadership retreat” for the upper ranks of the Pelted Fleet. This involves strife between the human and Pelted military cultures… along with some issues cropping up from Alysha’s past. We'll see Brighthaven again, too, for those of you who miss him. There’s a strong B-plot as well: Taylitha, left behind to see the ship through its refits, uncovers some criminal activity and gets to play heroine! This book is a straight Star Trek-like adventure with strong interpersonal threads, like the rest of the series.
• The Jokka novella, Red Honey: This abandoned, partially written novella tells the story of how the nomadic Jokka first settled. That’s right, it’s the history that Roika referred to in Pearl in the Void! We get to see how het Serean was founded, and why it wasn’t named after its eperu founder. Kediil, the renegade anadi healer from the short stories in Clays, returns as narrator… meets a love interest… encounters painful problems. As with all the other Jokka stories, this one is bittersweet, with tragic elements.
• Twin Kingdoms 3, Dumpling Hips: Dancer, Amet, and Always Falling are a strong triad, but they’re missing their fourth beloved. In this novel, we return to the capital after the events of Cantor, to a society in mourning… and there we dive into the culture of Dancer’s kingdom, and discover it’s not as homogeneous as it looked to Amet, who was, after all, an outsider. Amet, who decides it is time to arrange with an outside party for children, gets to wade hip-deep into alien marriage/family customs… and get, perhaps, more than he, or any of the others, bargained for. This book is a romance novel, complete with Happily Ever After, and finishes the first “storyline” for the series. (There were 5 books and 1 novella planned for the Twin Kingdoms setting; the follow-up arc is about Clouds and ens children.)
• Wild Card: What is this? Who knows! But I like to leave an open possibility, in case something comes up, or one of you requests something that captures all our imaginations!

So that's the story! I hope the ability to vote on one of these strikes you as a cool opportunity, as a member of my elite superfans... because you're the ones who make it possible. And hey, if we get to that second fan-voted project I will not be displeased. At all. :D