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Monthly Archives: February 2011

UK Cover for The Unfinished Song: Initiate and Taboo

I didn’t expect to do so many revisions to Taboo, the second book in The Unfinished Song, but wow, my editor had some great ideas that add just that perfect extra bit of yum to the story, and I am having so much fun with this book. I hope you guys will enjoy reading it as much as I am writing it.

Meanwhile, I wanted to share the news that there will be UK editions of the series. Ok, right now, everything about the books is pretty much the same (even the spelling, sorry UK readers) except… drumroll… the covers.

There’s this theory that Brits like different covers. Symbolic and schematic covers are supposed to be more popular than covers with people-oriented scenes.

I have no idea if this is a myth or reality. I suspect it’s nonsense. That is, I’m sure there are readers who prefer symbolic/schematic covers to people/scene pictures; however, their dispersion is probably statistically unrelated to their nationality. But hey, I’m willing to experiment. So here are the other covers. (US readers: if you really like these better, I think they are also available through the US store.)

Judging by my low sales in Amazon UK, it’s possible I don’t have any British fans anyway. Or maybe they were just waiting for the right covers to draw them in! If you shop on Amazon UK, consider adding these books to your shopping cart…. They need some UK love!

There are many authors featured there who have never had a traditional publisher. Everyone is talking now about Amanda Hocking, who has sold more than half a million ebooks in less than two years. This is not the norm, of course, but it shows that one can become a bestseller.
I don’t know if trad publishing is the brass ring or not, but I know that I was always too frightened to self-pub before because I was given to understand it would ruin my chances at a “real” publishing contract. I’m not afraid of that any more. If you can sell enough books to live on, that’s the “real” deal. I have already seen many cases where big pubs are wooing successful indie authors. The question the publishers have to answer is what is the added value that they bring to an author who is already paying their mortgage with their writing.
Note, I don’t disagree about the crud. The majority of self-pubbed writers are not serious or realistic about it, and they would have been unlikely to have been successful in trad publishing either. They aren’t anything publishers need to worry about. If anything, the gobs of bad books probably drive readers to look for a trusted brand, a publisher.
But I am talking about writers who had or could have held out for traditional publishing contracts and chose to self-publish instead. Here is the paradox: the writers who will do well in self-publishing are the same writers it will most hurt publishers to lose: writers who are talented, prolific and savvy about marketing.
I know of a couple small pubs who are hurting because of authors breaking contracts to self-publish, or demanding their rights back. I don’t know if that’s been a problem for you, but in this market climate, I’d say it’s a danger.
In a year or two, all publishers may switch to selling ebooks, and it’s possible that once again there will be no advantage to self-publishing. Or maybe publishing will be changed forever. Honestly, I don’t know.

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/observer/archives/2005/05/24/why_men_love_science_fiction_so_much.html

Why men love science fiction so much

Science fiction has a hold over the imagination that is both obsessive and conservative. Star Wars, Dr Who, Star Trek all inspire loyalty in audiences completely disproportionate to their artistic merit. Deviation from the established formulae – the rules of the fictional universe in which the drama unfolds – is despised by the hardcore fans. Star Wars loyalists didn’t hate the Phantom Menace because the acting and script were so bad, but because it contained canonical travesties. It had scientific-sounding mumbo-jumbo terms that were new. It created anachronisms that made nonsense of the film’s status as a prequel to the original Star Wars. There were things that were not in the spirit of the original. Likewise, the one-off 1996 Dr Who TV movie, starring Paul McGann, in which The Doctor is revealed to be part human, is loathed by real fans with a passion usually reserved for religious heresy. And why? Because, in a sense, it was religious heresy.
The successful science fiction series creates an alternative universe that can be grasped as a system. Any number of different stories might unfold therein, and all sorts of wild flights of fantasy can take off, but they must be justified without doing violence to the overall coherence of the system. Trivial details – the number of wrinkles on a Klingon’s brow – make up a body of sci fi law that is guarded, studied and debated by fans with the passion of Talmud scholars. In Star Wars as in any creed there are orthodoxies, schism and blasphemy.
But the appeal of the sci fi system to the ordinary fan lies not just in its orderliness, but in its finiteness. As with any holy text, the science fiction universe is knowable in its entirety. You can watch every single episode of Star Trek and learn everything there is to know about it. You can contain an entire universe in lists and DVDs. The kind of universe that is knowable by heart is much less threatening than the real universe outside, off screen, full of unpredictability and disorder.
It is my contention that the reassurance offered by a system of order, internal coherence, completability and collectability – a universe that can be put in alphabetical order – is particularly appealing to men.
Whether by social conditioning or nature women seem better able to adjust in adulthood to the irksome imperfection of the universe. Or perhaps their strategies for dealing with it are different. I can only speak for my own gender, and I can reveal that men are mostly dragged kicking and screaming into grown-upness. They never give up the secret hope that complexity will go away and leave them alone. They take refuge in trivia because facts, nice orderly facts, are psychological balm to the friction burns inflicted by contact with real life. This might take the form of obsessive devotion to a football club, a desire to possess a copy every Velvet Underground recording ever released or the ability to watch the Empire Strikes Back 57 times. It is the phenomenon known as geekiness, and it emerges at the point where the Venn diagrams of maleness and Autistic Spectrum Disorder intersect.
Science fiction appeals to geeks because it effaces all remants of the grown-up world. It is a parallel universe conducted entirely within the confines of childhood. Plus laser guns and space ships. And that, sadly perhaps, is sufficient to keep a lot of men very happy for a long time.

Cover Art for The Unfinished Song: Taboo

It’s a brave new world of epublishing, and one theory I would like to test is that cheaper, faster, shorter will win the day. But how does one do this with epic fantasy, which notoriously requires at least 300,000 words just to get the first 3000 characters introduced? (*cough* Robert Jordan *cough* Terry Goodkind *cough* Stephan King *cough* excuse me I have a cough, sorry about that *cough*) You can’t just dash out a 50,000 word epic fantasy once a month in your spare time. That’s what Sword & Sorcery is for.

The answer to the length of fantasy stories has always been to break them up into smaller, more digestible elements. Lord of the Rings is really one story published in three volumes, not three books. There’s a fine difference.

That’s how I am approaching my epic fantasy The Unfinished Song. I could publish a 400,000 word ebook, but I thought it would be more delectable to parcel it out in delicious snack sized bites of epic.

That also means, however, a rather grueling publishing schedule of one book out every two months–yikes!–good for readers, but definitely a schedule to keep me on my toes. There are revisions and edits and ARCs, oh my!

All of this is a lot of throat-clearing for the Big Reveal of the cover art for the second book in the series, Taboo. Out in March, fingers crossed! (Curse you, revisions!) So without further ado, here it  is:

Yes, it will also be available in trade paperback, starting in April. Book Three, The Unfinished Song: Sacrifice will be out in May.

What Does Change in Copyright Law Mean for Writers?

I caught this item of news from Piers Anthongy:

Meanwhile, of interest to other writers: Congress changed the law, and now publishers can’t hang on to an author’s rights until 70 years after s/he dies. The new Copyright Act allows authors and their heirs to terminate contracts 35 years after the contract date and “recapture” the books, regardless whether they remain in print, beginning with contracts dated 1978. All my books are on license, meaning I can get my rights back after about ten years, except for 17 at Random House/Del Rey. Now, year by year, I can start recovering them. Other writers should check this out, because their publishers will not tell them.


There’s a gold rush going on right now for the e-rights to millions of backlisted titles by previously published authors. A lot of these are older folks who aren’t comfortable with the new tech and may surrender their rights without realizing it. If you fall in this category, or you are related to a writer who does, you should tread with care. Or sell your rights to me. 😀

Google-Apple Smack Down

Apple and Google are going at it for the future of publishing! What does it all mean? Frankly, I have no idea. I’m hoping to sort through all of this and figure out what this means for writers, readers and books.

Here’s how Google responded to Apple’s subscribtion model:

Here’s the key nugget that everyone seems to be overlooking:
With Google One Pass, publishers can maintain direct relationships with their customers and give readers access to digital content across websites and mobile apps.
I’ve confirmed that this means that customer information collected by Google will be shared with publishers. What kind of information? Name, zip code, and most importantly, email addresses. Billing information will not be shared, we’re told. Users can choose to opt-out of sharing this information, but they’ll have to explicitly do so. By default, the information is shared.
And as we’ve talked about before, that’s a huge win for publishers who mainly fear these online subscription services because it could mean giving up their all-important rolodex of customer information. You know, the information they use to market stuff to you. With Google’s system, they’ll be able to maintain at least part of that direct relationship.
And that’s important because with Apple’s system, publishers are getting the shaft. The way Apple set it up, user data can be shared with publishers — but only if the users themselves explicitly choose to share it. When you subscribe to a publication, a pop-up appears asking if you’d like to allow the publisher to get your contact information. There are two options: “Allow” and “Don’t Allow”. It’s a simple option that will make sense to customers. But it also means that basically no one is going to share such information. Who in their right mind would?
Well, unless it’s shared for you, that is.
There is no question that Google’s system will be more flexible for publishers. And yes, Google will be keeping only 10 percent of the revenue from sales, as opposed to the 30 percent that Apple is keeping. But from a user perspective, given the data sharing situation, there’s no question that Apple’s system is more favorable.
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