Chicon Day 2

Started my second day full-steam by going to three panels in a row. My advice to other newbies is to avoid doing this. You need time, after a good panel, to process, and anyway the seats are uncomfortable. Don't sit still in them for four and half hours as I did. This morning, I turned around and ran out of a panel, even though it had Carol Berg in it, for that very reason.

The first panel I attended on was gender in SF literature, and all other panels that day seemed to echo all that I had heard at 9 am (even the one I attended this morning, "Men Writing Women," addressed some of the same issues).

The thing is that you can't talk about gender without addressing the society that constructs the gender. Cultures set up the expectations, the restrictions, and the consequences for deviation. When worldbuilding it is important to take this into account. I came away from the panel with a list of authors that address gender successfully (will post it later, if I can read my own handwriting).

So when we talk about "feminine" traits and "masculine" traits we are, in some ways, talking more about our culture than we are about the character or the individual. Among sensible authors the consensus seems to be that writing successfully means writing about human beings and not necessarily their genders. This also applies to 'strong female characters': human first, gender second.

After panel fatigue came setup for the Night Shade Party, or rather, waiting around to begin the setup for the Night Shade Party (housekeeping had to come and fiddle with things before we could begin). In the end I didn't help at all - it seems most of the work fell to Bradley Beaulieu (sorry!). Had dinner with Teresa Frohock and E.J. Swift (Osiris), got dressed and returned for the bug-eating party (eat a bug, get a free book), which was a great success. I finally met Jeremy Lassen who was wearing a most impressive bright orange suit, and many others, too numerous and show-offy to list.

All in all it was a great day. Today there will be fewer panels and more drinking, I expect.

My First Day at Chicon

Getting to the Hotel

Having lived in Chicago I didn't think much about taking the train and finding my own way to the hotel, but I quickly realized lugging a bag full of books across seven city blocks was not the best idea I ever had. I arrived at the Hyatt sunburned and sweating and stood in lines for some time. Teresa Frohock of Miserere fame arrived and together we went over an overwhelming amount of program information while the hotel went from full to packed. At last room keys became available and there was somewhere to hide from the crowds.

After a few hours my memories of walking under the hot sun faded to pleasant and I decided to do it again, taking a turn around the city looking for Treasure Island (a grocery store), and some vaguely healthy snacks. I dragged T. Frohock along with me, and luckily she loves walking circles in cities and has an amiable nature, because "I know about where it is" is a far cry from "I can take you right to it."

If you haven't met Teresa Frohock this is what you might not know: she is wicked smart and hilariously funny.

Evening

Courtney Schafer (The Whitefire Crossing) arrived with her brother Matt and friend Karen and I'm glad to have met all of them. Courtney is like a tiny ball of intense energy. Now I understand why she is in charge of things. Naturally the conversation turned to writing and the publishing biz. We talked about editing a book to its bones, working with schedules, and character-driven versus plot-driven stories.

While standing around in the hotel entrance (not very politely, I realize in retrospect), we were approached by Anne Lyle (The Alchemist of Souls) who is not in the least bit shy and will be doing 10,000 panels from what I can tell. From there we progressed to some actual seats and then, in an unexpected bit of luck, Courtney introduced us to Carol Berg who is a warm and engaging person. She talked to us about her own first Worldcon while I stood there like a teenager, not sure what to do with my hands. I mean, it was Carol Berg! I have every one of her books and you should, too.

We ended in the bar talking about biscuits versus cookies and bills versus checks. Anne sang the praises of Scrivener, and it sounds as if I will be an adherent before long myself. Then it was time to return to my little room, which is not quite a peaceful room (any time anybody in the hotel turns on the water, it sounds as if someone is screaming).


Now day 2 begins, and it's time to hit some panels. Hopefully I'll have some intelligent thoughts to post tomorrow morning.

Many Things Being Done, and Other Things Beginning

During the last two weeks I had the pleasure to join nine of my fellow authors for a Debut Authorpalooza at Staffer's Book Reviews (and occasional musings). Bradley Beaulieu, Elspeth Cooper, Teresa Frohock, Doug Hulick, Kameron Hurley, Mark Lawrence, Stina Leicht, Anne Lyle, Courtney Schafer, and myself each wrote a guest rant and posted an excerpt from our next book. Justin Landon did an incredible job herding all of us, getting all the posts ready and setting up the giveaways.

Giveaways? you might ask. Yes! There is still time to enter for a chance to win signed copies or even the grand prize. Check it out here.

You can read Chapter One of Knifesworn here.

We also held a huge, ridiculous, mind-boggling AMA on reddit. Thanks to Justin (again) and Steve Drew for their wrangling skills.

Also the revisions of the revisions of KNIFESWORN are nearly finished; soon you will hear me banging on about book three instead! I'm only a few months behind . . .

Finally, Night Shade Books has invited me to return as of the rotating authors on The Night Bazaar, so you will see me posting my odd opinions there, at least for a while.

That's what's old and what's new for today. Have a good one.

The end of an era

I don't have long to write. I want only to express how much things have changed. I was sad when I saw how few book stores remain, sadder when I realized there is now only one store left where I can purchase music, CRUSHED when my independent radio station was purchased by ClearChannel--and now I see the few non-chain cinemas around here are going out of business too. Well, damn. No more browsing, no more talking to knowledgeable staff, no more listening to music that hasn't been marketed up my butt, no more beautiful old movie theaters with real butter on the popcorn. Everything now will be mega-corporation slick, carefully targeted yet lacking flavor. Yeah it's been coming for a long time but now it's here. Welcome to THIS world, whatever it is. Bleh.

Small fish . . .

There's always a bigger fish. Qui-Gon Jinn said that, and I know you're not going to argue with a Jedi. And whilst there is always a bigger it's also the case that I am a small fish. In the writing world I'm a herring. Possibly red.

Anyway. The point is that small fish gotta hustle or they become small fish sticks. So, I've done my best to market The Emperor's Knife, spent a small fortune on posting copies hither and thither, and generally tried to hold up my end of the bargain any writer strikes with their publisher. I also keep a close eye on the painful business of bookscan which tears away the weasel words we writers comfort ourselves with and hits us upside the head with cold hard figures. Bookscan data is available to authors who sign with the program at Amazon and claims to catch about 75% of all sales on a weekly basis across the whole of the USA from bookshop tills to Amazon sales.

The graph below charts The Emperor's Knife sales across the 30 weeks since its US release.

You'll note a 'graceful decline' from modest beginings. This graceful decline carries us from roughly 80 sales a week early on to 40/week after 20 weeks. Sales halve in 20 weeks. At the point indicated by the arrow something happens. Sales start to halve every two weeks!

The fall across the first 20 weeks is the kind of profile most books have with sales slowly dropping as the initial rush for a new title fades and the reviews stop hitting the blogs. The fall for the last 10 weeks is something else. That's the profile of sales for a book that simply isn't being replaced on the shelves when copies are sold.

Now small fish have small publishers, in my case Night Shade Books, so I sent them an email to find out what the deal was. It turns out that NSB's distribution has been problematic of late. They had to switch distributors because the old one wasn't living up to expectations, and the change-over seems to have left quite a few crates of books stranded in warehouses... The good news is that whilst all the accelerated decline was due to books not being replaced - some of the decline was due to books not being replaced because there were no replacements to be had. In short, The Emperor's Knife sold out its print run but confusion over distribution combined with the imminent release of the trade paperback (now out) meant that a 2nd edition never quite happened.

So, I'm now a small fish that's happy the 4,000 hardbacks sold out, and sad I never got to boast about a 2nd edition.

At the end of it though, I'm still a small fish and if I don't watch my figures, watch my publisher, toot my horn, and do all those other things I gots to do + write another book ... well I'm going to get lost in the weeds or chewed up and spat out.

Come in. The water's lovely.

Quotes and passages

I seem to have inherited a notebook that belonged to my mother. In it she wrote down quick thoughts or quotes that she found meaningful. I've found she liked to describe unnamed people. To me these are snapshots that she took as she moved through life.


"A person who puts people under the obligation to attest to her niceness."

"Someone who enters, talking, switching on bright lights as he goes."

"The stance of one perpetually braced for a burden . . ."

"A woman has uncanny ability for sensing when talk is tending towards what is of no interest to her--or is threatening--and forestalls."

"Man going into hardware store--bad hip--GM retiree?--has a beautiful new car. I'm glad for him."

"Man walking--looks embarrassed to be seen, especially by women."

"Man who's beaten in an argument with a woman--looks bewildered--cheated--as if something critical has been overlooked, a mistake has been made."

"Scrubbed, smiling American ladies who are merciless and uncompromising."

"Strange woman walks up to fat girl eating ice cream cone with friends, snatches her cone and throws it away."


Don't be surprised if some of these turn up in a book of mine.

Knifesworn cover!

I've been working on about three different blog posts--one on religion in fantasy, one on record stores (or the lack thereof), and one about writing. But since none of those have been completed, I will instead show off the cover for Knifesworn!

The expected publication in the UK is still November (December in the US). I will update if that changes.