The Swamp Hag of Blackrock Fields

My first official new book release this year is the second book in my collection of fairy tales. Last summer, I released the the first, The Bald Princess and Other Tales, and now I'm excited to bring you the second, The Swamp Hag of Blackrock Fields and Other Tales. Currently, only the ebook version is available, but the paperback is in progress and should be ready soon.

As always, Patrons have already gotten their free copy! Click to become a patron!

I've had this book almost ready for months, but just now have had the time and energy to push it over the finish line. 

This is my second collection of original fairy tales, all of them drafted during 2022. On my mind this year were thoughts of loneliness and isolation, dealing with grief, and building relationships as an adult. I also thought a great deal about responsibility, and how to find the balance between our responsibility to ourselves, our families, and our community, especially in a world that is rapidly becoming more and more integrated.

We moved into a new town and a new state early in 2021, and have noticed the difficulties of making friends as adults, especially in an area where the majority of the population has different values and beliefs than us.

The internet has offered a wonderful connection point for both my spouse and I, allowing us to connect with people who share our values and beliefs on Discord servers, Slack, and social media. But lacking that in-person connection can also be challenging and isolating.

The internet and in-person meet-ups aren’t the only way to find connection, however. Stories offer connection as well, and not just to others in our time—but connection to the past.

There’s nothing quite like holding a 300-year-old book and imagining how many people have held it in their hands, read the words on the page, or kept it stored on their bookshelf. And there’s nothing I love more than seeing scribbled notes or drawings on the pages that show someone not only read the book, but had a relationship with it.

For my anniversary gift this year (seven years!), my spouse bought me a piece of petrified pine—280 million years old. The thought of the time, species, history, cultures, civilizations, and people that existed during those years is mind-boggling. Just the thought that someone found this tree made from stone, decided to slice it up and polish it up, and shipped it off to the Smithsonian, where it could be purchased by me? Incredible.

These original fairy tales might never make it farther than a few e-readers and the platforms the book is available on. But, at the very least, it is an attempt, by me, to communicate with the future. To offer some sort of shared narrative. To say, “These are the feelings I felt, the thoughts I had, the stories I wrote. Perhaps they’ll mean something to you, too.”

And just for fun, I made some character art using MidJourney!

The Transformation of My Original Series

I have another exciting announcement to make! Because apparently, this year is going to be marked by forward momentum. 

Those of you who have been around for a while might remember my first ever series, the Sagittan Chronicles. It was my "practice" series, as I like to call it, where I learned how to do everything from writing a book to publishing to cover design to marketing.

But there was one problem with the series: the title.

When I initially wrote the series, I picked the name of the planet (Sagitta) off a National Geographic star map from the 1970s. Literally, I closed my eyes and pointed, and that's how I got the name. That was before I learned I really need to google everything before I published, and I had zero awareness of anything related to astrology, other than that it was a thing that existed.

Once, in college, a guy asked me what my sign was, and confused, I replied, "A stop sign." So yeah. Not my area of expertise lol.

So you can imagine my shock and surprise the first time someone asked me if my book was about astrology. After that, I spent years fielding questions about astrology at every event I attended. A couple years ago, I finally gave up on trying to even market it, and focused solely my other books. So, as the 10th anniversary of the series approaches, I decided to do something crazy, and retitle everything, starting with the series name. No more astrology associations for me haha.

Meet the Zirian Chronicles! 

If you've already read the series, back when it was titled The Sagittan Chronicles, it's mostly the same thing. It's all the oldies but goodies, reedited and repackaged. I got rid of some of the tenacious typos that made it through my first couple redesigns and did some basic language massaging, but the stories are by-and-large the same. I also redesigned the ebook, and in a couple months (if all goes according to plan), the paperback editions will be available as well. I've also created Google AI narrated audiobook versions, which you can find in the Google Play store! 

As with my other series, book 1, now titled Sundered Sky, will be free on all retailers (hopefully, that's already happened, but Amazon does like to be difficult sometimes). The audiobook version on Google Play is also free!

I'll be honest, most of my redesign decisions were made with improving my marketing options at the forefront of my mind, but I'm very excited to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the series (March 28th) with this brand-new redesign. (And, if you are a patron, you get digital copies of all the new edition ebooks for free!)

The series has five books, one prequel, and two short stories, and I left it openended in case I feel inspired to write more in the universe in the future. The books, while they have some tie-ins and crossover characters, can be read in any order. The series is in chronological order, however, if you read them 1 - 5. 

The over-arching question of the series is how different people and cultures react to major technological change—or at least, that was the intention when I initially wrote it. It's set on a planet called Ziri (previously Sagitta), in a civilization who has a technology called Doors, which allow them to travel great distances quickly and easily—think portals, like in Stargate or Narnia.

In book 1, the Doors change from being able to go to only 1 other location, to being able to go to multiple locations, which creates chaos across the galaxy. 

Each book is about different people, how the Doors affect their personal lives, and what steps they take to adjust to the the changes.

I think if I had to pick, Singular Cipher or Fall of the Flighters is my favorite of the series. I actually felt a little sad when I published Fall of the Flighters originally (2021), because I knew since I wasn't marketing the series, hardly anyone would read it. 

But, with the new titles and redesign, I'm much more hopeful a few readers will like the series enough to make it to the end!

Below, if you're curious, you'll see the whole series evolution with all its various iterations over the years. It's interesting for me to see such a clear visual representation of my own growth.

If you have any questions about the series, please let me know! 

You can find them on all retailers, if you're curious to check them out. Thanks for sticking with me!

Writing Tips (Sometimes): The "Scam" Bestseller

This is part of my series of essays for writers. Get them delivered to your inbox by signing up here!

A perturbed Buck allowing me to take a selfie with him.

Recently, I went to a workshop offered by someone who claimed to be a bestseller and award winner, and said they were going to walk the audience through their path for how they got there. I mostly attended out of curiosity, and because I’ve been to other “bestseller” workshops, and wanted to see if it was just their story or if they were going to offer practical advice.

I was severely disappointed.

The author was counting “bestseller” as having once received the “bestseller” sticker on Amazon; they had not gotten on the USA Today, NYTimes, or any other list. Their “award” was one of those small ones you pay to get. And based on their Amazon rankings and cover design, I’m confident this author was not making a living from book royalties.

And yet, they used their “success” to create a workshop for authors.

Most of their tips revolved around how to use extroversion to sell books to strangers in person. And while these strategies can absolutely work for the right type of person, the fundamental premise of the workshop was flawed. Because this author wasn’t actually a bestseller or award winner—they were just like the rest of us, figuring it out as they went along, and having the occasional spot of luck during their journey.

The thing that really hit me the wrong way, though, was that this particular person was also selling marketing services. Their packages ranged from $100 to $1000 dollars per month and included: tweeting about their client’s book, posting about the book on their blog, sending out a newsletter to their audience, and being available to chat throughout the month.

The author was clearly hosting events targeted at newer, less experienced authors who wouldn’t know about other marketing options, and would hopefully buy their services for at least a month or two.

I have to be honest: I was pretty upset by this.

Not only because they misrepresented their qualifications in a clear attempt to get clients, but also because they couldn’t even answer the most basic questions asked by the audience. One person asked how they got reviews, and their answer was “I put a note in the back of the book requesting readers leave one.” (If you’ve been around a while, you know that this method is a particularly frustrating paradox: you need reviews to get sales, and sales to get reviews.) Another audience member asked how to get paperbacks into bookstores if you publish through KDP, and the author’s response was, “Oh, I carry them into the store,” with no information about other paperback distributors and the various methods available to indie authors.

My impression walking away from the workshop was that this author was a scam artist who used charm and charisma to get clients. Only three or four clients a month would be all they needed to get a pretty basic salary.

And this is not the first time I’ve seen this. These authors aren’t doing anything illegal, of course, but it feels extremely unethical to me—preying on newer, desperate authors who simply want to get the word out about their book and find new readers.

But there are many better, cheaper ways to do this. There are legitimate services out there that cost a lot less than $1000 a month. An author could pay for Amazon or Bookbub advertising, $0.99 and free book promos, or any number of other services from legitimate companies. This author wasn’t offering those. Just their own twitter account and blog. They didn’t even provide analytics for how many visitors they got per month, or how many likes and retweets.

To be honest, I’ve never attended a workshop by a “bestseller” (even at the New York Writer’s Digest Conference!) focused on explaining how they achieved that status, that turned out to have anything more useful than, “I wrote a book and got lucky.” One author I listened to speak, basically said they got several BookBubs in a row, but had no advice on how to actually get said promotion (it’s a selective lottery, but there are some choices you can make to possibly increase your chances). Another author happened to have a cousin who was a celebrity who then tweeted about the book. (I don’t know about you, but I am not related to any celebrities.)

I’m becoming more and more wary of workshops from authors who claim to be “bestselling.” Particularly if I’ve never heard their name before. In my opinion, the best approach is the slow approach. It’s not about making a bajillion dollars overnight, as nice as that would be. It’s about building a business slowly over time, making and following through on a plan, and sticking with it. If someone promises a shortcut to success, it’s probably a scam.

Wilfredo Potato doing acrobatics to try to force the door open while Rowan and Buck look on with mild bemusement.

January Cat News

Meet Buck!

Our most exciting cat news this January is the arrival of Buck, who moved in with us over New Year's weekend. Buck comes to us from a friend's mom, who moved to a new apartment that doesn't allow cats. So when they asked if we would take him, of course we said yes!

Buck is a hilarious cat, who growls instead of meows, is very sweet and loves to be petted, and who likes to sleep in the bathroom sink. He also likes chasing the laser and hiding.

We have many nicknames for him, including (but not limited to): Lord Buckington, Buckaroo, Buckaroni, Buck Nasty (pop culture reference if you don't know haha), Buckmeister, the Winter Soldier, the Buck-tastrophe, and Buster, because something about his personality reminds me of Buster from Arrested Development.

He's getting along with the other cats for the most part, and Blueberry, well... we're not even sure he's noticed there's another cat in the house!

He's a sweet cat and we're happy to have him!

Writing Tips (Weekly) Sometimes

Happy New Year, and as they say, New Year, New Me!

Just kidding—same old me, but I am evolving and changing.

One of the things I’ve been working on for just over a year is a newsletter for authors and writers (you can sign up here!). I had set up a completely different blog for it as well, but as it turns out, I’m too old for that nonsense, so I’m condensing everything down to make my life simpler. Which means I will share all my posts here!

In addition, I’ve decided to change the format of the newsletter.

Previously, my focus was on providing single tips that a writer could hopefully use as they go about the business of being author, but as I’ve grown, I’ve been finding the single tips format limiting. (Not to mention, I’m much more of a long-form writer than a micro-copy writer, which you’ve probably noticed haha.)

What I want is to actually be able to look at whole experiences and provide nuance and perspective around those experiences.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

Moving forward, I’ll be sharing experiences I’ve had at conferences or workshops I’ve attended, in the newsletter and here on my blog, or answering questions I’ve received from workshop attendees. You can also submit questions if you have them, by filling out this form.

In the meantime, if you want to learn more about me, you can click here to check out some of the resources I’ve put together for other writers, or to view the books I’ve produced on writing. You can also join my discord server of writers if that’s something that interests you. (Discord is a chat platform like Slack; it’s free and has a web, desktop, and mobile app.) We hang out during the day, run sprints, have a writing-specific book club, and have conversations about writing, marketing, publishing, and more. Writers of all experience levels are welcome.

I hope your new year is treating you well!