TRADE RELEASE DAY
It’s release day for the trade paperback version of The Ultra Thin Man!
That’s it. Really. All I got. Except the graphic of the trade cover flat below. Beauty.
Move along [to a bookstore and buy a book].
TRADE PAPERBACKS ARRIVE!
A second post in the same day? Well, why not? Particularly when a lovely box filled with lovely trade paperbacks of The Ultra Thin Man arrive.
But I’m not going to say much in this post. I’ll say (1) the trade comes out July 28, and (2) buy that sucka.
Now here are some pictures (click for larger), and the unboxing video!
WORLD FANTASY AWARD NOMINATION
Yesterday I found out I’d made the final ballot of this year’s World Fantasy Awards, to be presented in Saratoga Springs, NY, later this year. The World Fantasy Award has been described as one of the three most prestigious speculative fiction awards, along with the Hugo and the Nebula Awards.
But The Ultra Thin Man is science fiction, you say!
Yeah. This isn’t about MY writing. This is about my small press, Fairwood Press. The award category is “Special Award: Nonprofessional.” (Note: not Unprofessional.) There’s also a “Special Award: Professional” category. Meaning, I don’t make a living off this venture, or pay certain pro rates to writers (although some of my writers’ books have made more money than some pro books out there, for the press and writer both). The full ballot is listed right here. What’s great is that I have a lot of friends on this list in other categories! Congrats (and good luck) to all of them.
This is an award in recognition for my work with Fairwood, which spans about 20 years, starting back in the Talebones magazine days. Back then, Fairwood was a basic umbrella company and I was throwing out some specialty chapbooks, such as the original edition of Ken Rand’s The 10% Solution. In 2000, I incorporated, and Fairwood Press, Inc. was born. As of this year, there exists some 70 book titles, which includes the four new books coming out this summer.
For all of that time, with the exception of the earliest Talebones years, when we were producing some of those first Fairwood books, I’ve worn all the hats at Fairwood Press. It’s a lot of work, and typically there’s not a lot of recognition. This is the first nod, award-wise, in 20 years, except for a short story in Talebones, “Still Life with Boobs” by Anne Harris, which was on the final Nebula Award ballot for best short story. But that was an award nomination for Anne.
I’m thrilled beyond belief, of course. Mind you, there are a lot of worthy names on that ballot for this category, and I would consider it a bit of an upset if I pulled it off and won the thing. But I wouldn’t mind, of course. The award trophy itself is . . . interesting! It’s a bust of H.P. Lovecraft, designed by cartoonist Gahan Wilson, all in honor of Lovecraft’s work and contributions to the world of fantasy. The 
award has a nickname, too: A “Howard,” Lovecraft’s first name. It’s not one of the best looking awards, but you know? Looking at it from my position now? It looks damn beautiful. I can think of an instance in November when it would look even more beautiful.
Now I must make plans to somehow get to the World Fantasy Convention in Saratoga Springs. A convention that’s been sold out for a while now. Where there’s a will . . .
BOOK TWO … AND WHAT’S NEXT
The Ultra Big Sleep is in the hands of my agent after another editing pass and incorporating some first reader comments. More comments from readers are still coming, but I needed to at least get the book and a synopsis out there so my agent can pitch it to my editor.
I realize, at this very moment, I’ve not even thought about the short elevator pitch for this sequel. Hmmm. I’ll work on that.
My agent came up with a great one for The Ultra Thin Man after it sold to Tor, so we could announce it in various venues. It’s now the 2nd sentence of my summary on the front page of my site, interspersed between Tor’s own summary.
Hurry up and wait. Not much I can do now with this book. If I get more comments from first readers that are crucial, I can still get them in and resend the file before my editor reads the book. Or even after he reads, if he’s interested in it.
I could work on book three. That is, once my seat-of-the-pants writing process throws me a title and comes up with that first inciting WTF moment. I’ve also thought about writing a short story with my main characters from book one. I’ve not done a lot of short story writing in a loooong time. Maybe it would be good for me to give it a whirl.
Meanwhile, I ought to be seeing my own copies of the trade paperback version of book one pretty soon!
PRODUCTIVITY and JUGGLING WRITING, FAIRWOOD, GRADING, LIFE
As I write this, two weeks remain in the school year. As a high school English teacher, this can turn out to be a busy time. For example, I have about 35 creative writing students finishing up short stories, and they’re due at the end of this week, because seniors are done then, graduating on Saturday. It means a lot of plot outlines, character studies, opening pages, rough drafts, and final drafts to go through.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to work my way through a read-thru and edit of The Ultra Big Sleep, sequel to The Ultra Thin Man.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to get five Fairwood Press books ready for this summer for their official release at the World Science Fiction convention in Spokane, WA.
Meanwhile, I also have a lot of “also need to do this” things on my list. And it would also be nice to have some sort of life outside of all these things. Yesterday, that never felt more true, with a full day to myself, and stacks of work facing me. I met a friend for a late breakfast, and then came home ready to work.
And…… I couldn’t. I mean, I did a few things, but I didn’t even make a dent. I couldn’t even venture outside into the 80 degree weather to soak up the sun. Really, I don’t particularly like the sun when it’s making my world 80+ degrees. So I sat inside, in air-conditioned comfort, and proceeded to read for an hour or so. And then I watched some television shows via Netflix. I rarely get the time to do this (except during the summer). I watched five episodes of A&E’s series Longmire, and finally finished the first season. (I’d watched the first 5 episodes months before.)
I could’ve worked out for an hour. I could’ve done some editing. Could’ve done some Fairwood work. But none of that happened. I did finish a few of the creative writing stories I had on my lap as I watched. I sat glued to the couch and the TV (and enjoyed the episodes), but I also brooded. A chunk of me wanted to be outside, hanging out with someone. (See, I didn’t have my son Orion with me during the weekend.) I did do a couple of out-and-about things with friends: A movie on Friday night. Firepit gathering with another group of friends on Saturday night. That breakfast Sunday late morning. But when I was home, I gloomily stared at the pile of work and said SHUT UP to it. And brooded.
It’s maddeningly difficult to juggle so many balls in the air. I’ve been told it sometimes seems effortless to those on the outside looking in, wondering at my tenacious work ethic and prolific output. How do I do it all? In the end, I guess I do get a lot more done than would sometimes seen humanly possible (sleep is sometimes a luxury), but I also put a lot of pressure on myself. When I feel overwhelmed, I’m not very productive. To tell the truth, I would’ve accomplished more this past weekend if Orion had been here. I would’ve managed to check off a smattering of tasks from all categories in the blog post title, and still been able to have lots of quality hangout time with Orion.
I have people in my life who are very important to me, for various reasons. When I don’t see them, I freak out a little. I second guess myself. Do I feel like I’m missing out on something good? Maybe. Is it the extrovert in me wanting to get out and socialize? Likely.
Everything will even out a whole bunch in the next few weeks, I’m sure. When summer is in full swing, perhaps I’ll find my second wind for the year 2015.
FIRST READER DRAFT & PROCESS
A few days ago I finished a 3rd draft of The Ultra Big Sleep, the sequel to The Ultra Thin Man. With this book I’ve been able to highlight some of the milestones in its creation, whereas the first novel was sold and on its way by the time this webpage came into existence. This new novel has gone through a markedly different process in many ways. For one, it’s not taking mumblety-mumble-mumble years to finish. Because a follow-up book can’t take too long to come out into the world after the first one. The process overall has sped up. And yet I wanted it to go faster. And I’m not done with it by any means. I’ll be editing the 3rd draft from a printout of the book.
Regardless, I’m now in the position of being able to send out the book to trusted first readers to read through it, even as I’m continuing to edit from my end. These are all readers who read book one. I should probably also get someone who has not read the first one to see if it stands alone well enough. I’m also sending it to my agent now to read through. He can give me feedback and also get the ball rolling on pitching this book to my editor. I don’t have a deal for this book (The Ultra Thin Man was a one-book deal), so it still has to catch the editor’s attention. I also will be getting a very short synopsis/outline ready.
That being said, sales of book one will play into any decision about book two. Hard cold facts. Tor has to see they made back a good chunk, if not all, and then some, of their investment. That’s a bit scary. There are still trade paperback sales to come. More ebook sales when the price goes down.
So feel free, everyone, to punch up those sales numbers and buy that space opera noir novel you have been itching to buy by yours truly! I’m working hard to get the next one out there.
PAPERBACK PALPITATIONS
First: Has it really been THAT long since I posted last? Yeesh. Must. Do. Better.
This quick note explains that the trade paperback edition of The Ultra Thin Man will be out on July 28! It’s already up on sites for preorder, such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com, sans cover art. I’m looking forward to seeing physical copies of this edition!
Meanwhile, I’m putting the final touches on The Ultra Big Sleep, the sequel, and should soon be giving my agent a looksee. I’m pretty happy with the way it’s turning out.
DRAFT COMPLETE
Quick word here to say that the first draft of the sequel to The Ultra Thin Man is done! The Ultra Big Sleep has come in at 115,000 words. But … ’tis a rough draft, of course. Much work needs doing as I begin revisions. I expect the length to be somewhat shorter after all is said and done.
I finished the draft on Friday night….no, er, Saturday morning, at 4 a.m. It’s been composting since then, and I won’t look at it again until Wednesday night, when I return to the Rainforest Writers retreat for the 2nd of three sessions. The time between is not only for composting, but also for deciding how best to approach the revision process.
Wish me luck!
MAKING IT TO A 1ST DRAFT MILESTONE
At 3:00 a.m. I snapped the picture below.
I’m going to have this post hit two big points. One, although it’s not entirely secret these days (in fact it came out in several publicity interviews for book one), the working title of book two is THE ULTRA BIG SLEEP. I give a nod to a different noir title and a different noir author, the wonderful Raymond Chandler.
The bigger news in my opinion, is that I’ve broken the 100,000 word mark on this sequel to THE ULTRA THIN MAN. And I’m oh-so-close-to-done with this first draft. A couple small chapters and an epilogue is my guess. The first novel went in to my editor at 96,000 words. After edits and additions, the final product came out to be 107,000 words. I can see book two’s first draft wanting to come close to that 107,000 word mark, maybe a bit longer.
To be honest, until I hit 90,000 words with this current book, I still wasn’t 100% sure how it was going to end. That might be scary to some writers out there, and worrisome to readers, but part of this “question markery” is due to my stubborn, organic, seat-of-my-pants writing style.
I’m a “pantser” through and through, throwing my characters into weird, dangerous situations around a thread of a plot idea (all in relation, somehow, to the events of book one). I was concerned that the ending hadn’t come to me when I hit what I thought might be the 3/4 mark of the novel, but I trusted where my characters had taken me. At the end of the manuscript file, I jotted down note after note and bullet point after bullet point about all the things I had to attend to when I went back. Oh yeah, she’s gotta do this back in chapter ten. And This character has to go. Or This crucial point has to come up during this scene back here or I’ll never make this other chapter fly. Or This chapter has to come much later. (Well, that last thing I had to fix before I could go on, but you get the point.)
By 90,000 words I wasn’t worried. It’s why everything’s been going so slow, though. I had to move all my pieces carefully, trusting that the end game was there. Let the chips fall where they may. My subconscious knew the ending, so I didn’t panic. I’d had very few rollbacks writing this. In other words, only twice did I have to back up a half chapter, or a chapter, or slide things around during the process of this first draft. For this book I’m not under deadline. Perhaps a future novel will be, and I won’t be able to afford such a leisurely process.
Still, in comparison to the years (decades?) it took to write book one, I’m cranking this sucker out as if I were at the tail end of an adrenaline-filled, 5-hour ENERGY-fueled all-nighter. It’s like Finals Week. I’ve got to fight to the end, cram and study, so I’ll be more than ready to take the Final.
And then I’ll get to crash. One would say I’ll be able to take a very big sleep.
BOOKSCAN NOT USUALLY CLOSE TO BOOK SALES
Has it really been since the end of November when I posted last? Hurray, holiday season, and all that.
I’m prompted to write this post because of a certain paranoia about book sales of The Ultra Thin Man. Oh yeah, Swenson, how’s that going? Well, in reality, authors don’t really know for quite some time. My book’s only been out about five months. The reporting period for Tor that I’ve fallen into is July – Dec, and I’m told that actual royalty reports for that time period don’t go out until late April. It’s a long time to suffer in silence.
To be honest, I’ve been mostly nervous because of a sales bellwether that’s become fairly well known since Amazon started allowing its authors access to it: BookScan. It’s owned by those folks with the television ratings, the Neilsen Brothers. No, wait, that’s a carpet and flooring company. Well, Neilsen, the TV people. They did a SoundScan, too, for music sales, and its success lead to BookScan. BookScan relies on point of sale data from a number of major book sellers. According to Wikipedia, in 2009 Nielsen BookScan’s US Consumer Market Panel covered 75% of retail sales. (Having added Walmart recently, they say it’s now 80%.)
So if I go to my Amazon account and look at my BookScan account, it should be showing me 75% of my actual number of sales. Well, no. Well, maybe. Truth to tell, the number is all over the map. I’ve heard 50%, I’ve heard 30%. I’ve heard lower. I stare at that number on my account, the number of hardcover copies sold (and remember, the data for this is coming from most high street booksellers, but not from every book store) and I despair. Oh my god, this is horrible. That’s it? This number does not include ebook sales, by the way, but still… It also doesn’t include library sales, and my book was listed twice in Publishers Weekly as a book receiving a starred review, and often that means extra library orders. Nor does it count international sales (not a factor for me, as of yet, with no foreign edition forthcoming). It also doesn’t include independents. Really, it’s just trade sales, point of sale.
Well, it was time to bite the bullet. A fellow Tor author said, “Call your editor and talk to him. You can discuss numbers.” And earlier this week, I did, catching him in his New York office. First, right up front, I’ll tell you that the ebook sales are pretty low. I was surprised at the number, actually. It’s not unheard of for this to be the case, while the ebook is priced at $12.99 and the hardcover is out. It will probably sell 2 – 4 times as many copies when the price drops (when the trade paperback is out later this year).
Then I heard the hardcover numbers. My body relaxed instantly. Nutshell? A better than average debut, at least at this point in the game. But then again, still not stellar, and maybe I’m still on the edge as far as them taking on book two, because these don’t necessarily mean point of sale numbers. Because, returns. So book two may be dependent on trade paperback sales, library sales and ebook sales continuing forward. Returns have come in, although relatively low at the moment. If there’s to be really yucky news, it would make itself known in the next month or so when stores are doing their post-Christmas returns.
But the point of all this….my Neilsen BookScan number? Turns out it is only THIRTEEN PERCENT of actual hardcover sales. [Edit: Thanks to some in-the-know information from publisher Sean Wallace of Prime Books, note: returns don’t factor in to this number. The number my editor gave me are what’s out there in distribution, and so the sales number may actually be lower. And a rough estimate there, based on what can be seen from library holdings of my book so far, brings that number Bookscan is reporting closer to THIRTY percent. And remember, this is just my scenario.]
There are many who say BookScan is fast becoming irrelevant, particularly in today’s shifting book market. Me, I just would love for this book to do well so I can sell the next one! Have you been waiting to buy that ebook or take the plunge and fork over the bucks for that spendy hardcover? Wait no longer! If nothing else, BookScan numbers remind me that sales could be a lot better.
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