On To Homecoming!

Now that Schism has been published, it’s time to start moving forward on my next(last?) published novel, Homecoming.  Homecoming is my first real sci-fi novel to be published, which is weird for me because when I was a kid, that’s all I read for enjoyment.  In fact, one of the main reasons I started writing in the first place was to write science fiction.

I’m still a ways off from publishing(2021?).  I’m not even to finding a cover yet.  First, I have to rebuild my cash reserves since publishing can be expensive unless sales exceed expenses(hint, hint – buy my books and reduce that for me 😊 ).  I also need to conduct a final edit myself before looking for an outside editor(truth be told, I’ll likely seek out the same editor I used for Wrongful Death).  There are a few mistakes in Schism that have to be corrected and resubmitted – a genuine pain in the ass – but since it’s a more conventional novel, I need a more conventional editor.

Of course, when I say “conventional,” I mean conventional from a grammar and spelling standpoint.  Homecoming itself is anything but convention – I wrote it in a journal format.  It tells the story of humanity returning to Earth several thousand years after being forced off by a genocidal alien race, and it does so from the point of view of a historian chronicling events for the record.  It’s not something I’ve ever tried before, but I’ve seen it in action and wanted to give it a go.  I think it makes a more run-of-the-mill story stand out a bit more.

I’ll keep folks updated as I move ahead.  I don’t have a definitive publication date yet, and I’m wondering how to handle that.  Regardless, it may be my last publication unless I can earn more money.  No, I won’t stop writing, but I’ve got to have enough money to do wacky things like pay my mortgage.

But that’s for later.  For now, the next novel publication awaits!

Character Depth

Books can either focus on characters or plot.  Obviously most books have some amalgamation of the two, but usually one or the other takes a slight edge in focus.  Sometimes it’s extreme, as in World WarZ(where the “main” character is only chronicling events) or The Old Man and theSea(where the boat ride and fishing takes a back seat to the old man).  But yes, most books have a better balance.

I write this because Schism has a few characters that the story is told through, but they’re not the focal point of the story.  As such, the secondary characters around them become even more extraneous.  I’ve got characters in Schism that appears once with important information, and then they dissolve into the background, never to be seen again.  The biggest challenge with this was remembering who was involved at certain stages since they were more vehicles to take us through the plot rather than people of independence who were vital to what was going on.

Perhaps this shows I’m a cold-hearted bastard who doesn’t care about people.  That’s not the case as far as I see it, but I can see how folks could come to that conclusion.  Honestly, I’m not much of a people person, and creating characters of depth drains me.  It’s necessary, but notice that my first few books contain very few folks that we get to know well.  In a book like Wrongful Death, there’s one person who spends a lot of the story alone.  Even the villain in that story is only there to push the main character forward.

Like I said, maybe I’m just more captivated by story, so few people involved need depth.  Think about how exhausting your own life is, and that’s just you.  If you had to live the lives of five to ten other people just as fully, wouldn’t it wear you out as well?

Multiple Reads

When I find a book I enjoy, I’ll go back and read it time and time again.  The reason is that while I enjoyed it the first time, and the unknown nature of what I was reading is exciting, reading something a second, third, and fourth time is like returning to your childhood home and finding stuff you overlooked the first time.

The places most of us grew up in are familiar to us.  We feel safe.  That doesn’t mean we know them completely, so finding new things in a safe environment is comforting and provides its own excitement.  I’m currently re-reading Doctor Sleep, and I’m finding stuff I missed the first time.  I loved The Shining, so naturally I gravitated towards its sequel.  Although I found Doctor Sleep to be a fun read, it didn’t have the greatness of The Shining.  However, going through again has let me immerse myself more in the world and appreciate it in greater detail.

I wonder how alone I am in such an appreciation.  How many of you re-read your favorites over and over again?  Is it for new discovery or the safety of familiarity?

Sci-Fi Bizarro-Land

I adore science fiction when it’s well written.  The possibilities and speculation spurs my imagination.  I’ve loved it since I was a kid, and while browsing at a bookstore, I spend most of my time in the sci-fi section.

Unfortunately, a lot of science fiction is just plain weird.  I don’t know if that’s because writers in general are weird, or if science fiction attracts weirdos for writers.  While I enjoy possibilities, sometimes I see them go off into the truly bizarre, speculating about independent brains wandering through space seeking to transcend dimensional barriers.  Maybe that fires up some folks, but I’m not one of them.

Perhaps my world view is simply too grounded in reality, which I know is a strange thing for a fan of science fiction to claim, but I want my stories, while being fantastical, to still be possible, ie – something I can relate to.  When writers start talking about ribbons of energy that interweave through metaphysical fabrics of time, space, and spirit, it gets too esoteric for me.

I think I’ve said before that sci-fi is usually either great or horrid, with rarely anything in between.  I rate the strange stuff as horrid, even if it’s supposedly well written.  While I know we need to get that alien cultures are different, there still has to be a degree of relatability for the audience to enjoy a book.  Of course, some of these weird tales gain great fandoms and win lots of awards, so maybe it’s just that I’m the weirdo.

Trying To Expand

I told all of you before that I’m trying to expand out my reading habits.  I tend to get caught in a few books that I’ll read over and over again.  When I find a writer I enjoy, I’ll read and re-read their work.  Unfortunately, that also limits me sometimes as I don’t find fresh stuff as often as I’d like.

Therefore, I’ve tried to expand my horizons…and I’m failing miserably.  I picked up Earthclan by David Brin and have tried getting into it several times.  I really have.  I’ll pick it up, read ten or twenty pages, and make a date to read the next ten or twenty the following day.  However, I’ve had to go back and re-read several times, and I’m barely beyond page 100.

This hearkens back to what I wrote a few days ago about the weirdness of science fiction.  The basic premise of what Brin wrote is good – species throughout the galaxy “uplift” other species into sentience, whereupon that species owes fealty to its progenitor for 100,000 years.  However, not only have humans uplifted themselves without any sponsor, but they uplifted two other species(dolphins and chimpanzees).  Now humanity has found a derelict fleet of spaceships that may hearken back to The Progenitors(ie, the first sentient species in the galaxy), and everyone is fighting over the crew that found the prize.

Sounds great, right?

Unfortunately, Brin also writes it in a kind of weird style, even with the Terran ship in question.  I get needing to mix things up to show alien differences, but it is often incomprehensible(to me), and I can’t understand some of the significance of what’s going on.  If things were a little less…alien, then I could enjoy it more.

That’s where I find myself with a lot of books I want to read – they have a great premise, but the writing is so out there for me that I can’t follow it well enough in order to enjoy the work.  Perhaps there are simply some authors I can’t get in to, but it gets both time consuming and expensive to keep trying out new ones.  Maybe that’s why I’d like to get back to browsing bookstores again.

Fame & Fortune

I’ve made it, right?  After all, I just published a book, so obviously my success is assured.  I mean, everyone who has a book out is rich and famous, waking up when they want and partying all night.  That’s the image I’ve been given about us authors all my life.

Except, of course, that that’s nowhere close to true.  My books have yet to sell well, and even if they did, they’d have to sell blockbuster for me to quit my current job and write full time.  I’d need to be a big-time name whose fans line up by the hundreds of thousands just to buy my next work, hanging on a thread for the next publishing date.

See, there’s this grand misconception about writers, that we’re all rich and famous and that we worry for nothing but how to craft our next word.  If only that were true.

Most writers don’t make enough to do this full time, and most of those that try end up starving.  Breaking through in writing, like most things in life, requires talent, hard work…and a break.  Like, a big time break.  Something to make your work go viral.

Don’t tell most of the public.  Most folks know no one who has written and published a book.  Since the only writers they know of are named King, Rowling, or Patterson, they assume that anyone who is published has achieved great monetary success.  And certainly those people exist, but like the NFL star QB is a tiny fraction of those who ever played football, the stupendously successful writer is a small percentage of those of us who write.  Even the people I work with think that I’ll probably quit my job any day now and focus exclusively on writing.  I made them a deal – they buy 750,000 copies of my book, and I’ll stop annoying them at meetings and sending emails about the next project.

Success would be great.  It’d be fantastic.  But it’s not guaranteed, and a book isn’t necessarily full success.  Remember, any idiot can write a book – see what’s out there if you doubt that – but only the great and lucky ones grow wealthy from it.

Reciprocal Promotions

Some folks like Sarah Hoyt and Jon del Arroz have been gracious enough to grant me a place on their sites for promotion.  These fine authors use their platforms to help me gain more, and I’m humbled.  That said, it’s not enough.  I need more coverage to find a way to break out.

That said, I’m not above reciprocating in some way.  I will happily promote any writer that promotes me.  After all, we need to support each other, right?  So let’s share audiences – I’ll promote your work if you promote mine.  Isn’t that just common courtesy?

Release Excitement Fades

It’s exciting releasing a book.  Most authors I know feel as if their work is their baby, so letting others see it can be both exciting and nerve-wracking.  There’s also the satisfaction of others telling you they’re proud you published, even if they leave off praising the work(which we hope they do).  It’s sort of like a new relationship, and it feels fresh.

Like most relationships, however, that excitement fades over time.  No, it doesn’t diminish the work or make you less wedded to it; it simply changes the nature of it.  As time passes, excitement gives way to a kind of complacency.

That has happened with Schism.  I love the book, but it has now been out for almost two months.  I post about it on social media from time to time, but it doesn’t generate the same buzz it once did.  This happens with all of my books, and it happens with all of the books of other authors too.  Think about it – are you as excited over HarryPotter and the Deathly Hallows as you were in 2007?

Maybe that’s why authors want to push to the next story.  Yes, we have a multitude of ideas we want to write about, but we also seek fresh challenge and new territory.  We want to rekindle that fire we felt when our latest book released.  It’s an unending struggle, like the addict who continues to seek the high they got their first time.  Hopefully my journey won’t be as destructive as that, though.   😊

Twitter Dumpster Fire

While I spoke in an earlier post about needing to stay off of social media for personal stuff, I need to re-engage for professional/writing reasons.  Yes, only about 20% of people use Twitter, but it can be a good platform to reach audiences.  I’m not on much, although I’ve tried being on a little more recently, so I need to figure out how to use it to my best advantage.

That said, most of Twitter is a dumpster fire.  I try my best to stay away from controversial topics and post mostly stuff about my books.  I suppose I could also retweet stuff I find interesting from other authors, so long as it’s writing/book related.  However, so many want to go on about controversial topics and attract toxic replies.  People hide behind keyboards, saying stuff on Twitter that they’d never say in person, and it brings out the worst in most.

Am I playing with fire with Twitter?  Perhaps.  Perhaps I’m not playing with anything since I won’t go into the mud on that platform.  Seems like it’s one of two extremes – either one is being a scumbag to get likes and retweets, or one posts mostly banal stuff and never gets noticed.  Kind of reminds me of high school, and I hated high school. :-P

Monthly Blogging Process

More than one – and by that, I mean barely enough to qualify for that moniker, but I’ll take what I can get – of you has asked how I got back to posting three times a week.  What’s my process?

The hardest part, honestly, is determining fresh topics.  Anyone can barf current thoughts on a page, but even streams of consciousness need a basic structure.  I learned a while back that I’m terrible at remembering topics down the road once I think of them, so I’ve got a sheet of scrap paper next to my computer where I write down the ideas I get.  If I’m in the kitchen or watching TV and I get a thought, I walk in and write it down because, once again, I’ll forget if I decide to save it for later.

As I get to ten or more ideas, I start to write the posts in Word.  I do three or four in a day(when I can manage that), and I save them to a blog folder.  They’re labeled, but they’re missing any external links, so that comes in when I post to Blogger.

Some day near the end of the month, I go into Blogger and spend half an hour or so cutting and pasting in, as well as adding any links I think work.  I then add keywords and schedule for late Sunday night, late Tuesday night, and late Thursday night during the following month.  And that’s it.

I have to do it this way or the posts won’t get made.  I’ve tried it daily and weekly, and I get behind, discovering late at night a post is due the next day.  That’s how I end up going days or weeks with no post…or how you get a post about no post tonight.  Not the best way to stay consistent.  I just gotta make sure I knuckle down and do it before the end of the month.  :-P

Books Or Blogs

I feel torn right now.  I know I need to keep up my blog so that the five folks who follow it will stay engaged, but it takes time to write the requisite number of posts to stay afloat there times a week.  However, I also have a new book that has been eating at me, and I really want to get to work on that(I’ve written 1000 words(twice), but I want to get through the first chapter).

I know the answer is to knuckle down and finish my blog posts in three or four days, which would free up the rest of the month to write on the new book(when I can motivate myself to do so), but the new job(relatively new…since last November) limits my ability to do that if I want to spend any time with my family.  Is there a way to get that done without feeling tied to this site?  It’s not like the posts are hard – they’re mainly streams of consciousness and not plotted out(aside from figuring out the topic) the way my novels are.

Books or blogs – how to I prioritize?  Do I prioritize?  If I could just write full time instead of needing a bill-paying job, there’d be no issue.  But alas, that’s not yet reality.  :-P

I Miss Bookstore Browsing

I’ve written before about how I like to spend my free time browsing through a bookstore.  I can spend an entire day looking over books, reading a few chapters of several, and deciding which ones are worth the investment to bring home.  Such a day gives me peace in the storm of the world.

Unfortunately, the pandemic has brought that peace to a screeching halt.

I don’t want to get into a COVID-19 debate.  I’m not here to talk about its effects, or what people should be wearing.  All I’m doing in this space is acknowledging its impacts on society, and those impacts include bookstores, which are mostly shuttered to browsers right now.  I don’t know of a single bookstore in the area I’m in that is open to the general public.  Even libraries only allow a few people in, and only for a limited amount of time.  So I can’t indulge in just meandering lazily through the aisles on a sleepy Saturday.  And I miss it.  A lot.

I will be so glad when this mess ends so I can get back into my pastime(assuming any bookstores remain open to browse).  Yes, I know I can look on Amazon or some other website for books, but it’s not the same.  For starters, it’s hard to find that rare jewel on Amazon that you can find while looking at a shelf.  Additionally, since I enjoy the physical feel of a book over ebooks, I can’t pick something up from Amazon and flip through it for an hour deciding if it’s worth buying.

So I feel a little lost in the current pandemic.  Some people want to go back to bars, some people want to go back to ballgames – I want to go back to bookstores.  Yes, I’m a total dork, but I’m fine with that.

Pissing Off Both Sides

I’ve been pretty pleased with the initial reception of Schism.  However, given its touchy subject matter, I didn’t expect it to be non-controversial.  And it hasn’t been.  Basically, by trying my best to take a more neutral approach, I’ve managed to piss off the die-hard partisans on both sides.

I think the funniest thing is that such hardcore partisans don’t understand that they’re the ones Schism is talking about most.  Those so entrenched in their positions that even talking to those on the other side are the ones who will lead us to ruination one day.  Mark my words – it’ll happen.  And both sides, convinced so much of the righteousness of their views, will take the ship down with them as they poke holes in the bottom.

A few years ago, I wrote several posts to see if I could blog/write from points of view different than my own.  I wrote as a religious fundamentalist, anatheist, a rightwing nutcase, and a leftwing loon.  I think I did an okay job, because many people have yet to be able to figure out where on the spectrum I come down.  And I brought that into Schism.  But in doing so, I’ve managed to make both sides mad at me.  The comments I’ve heard are along the lines of “there is no moral equivalency here” and “I’m not reading something that thinks I’m anywhere close to at fault as those bastards over there.”

Of course, this chasm is the essence of Schism.  Is the violence of a 2^nd Civil War what it will take before folks calm the hell down?  I hope not, but I also hope that I win the Powerball and grow seven inches – sometimes life just doesn’t work out the way I’d like.