by john | Oct 28, 2015 | Writing
Here’s a quickie for you about what’s going on and what’s coming up soon.
First, a new Bubba the Monster Hunter Novella just dropped yesterday. Moon over Bourbon Street is the beginning of Season 3, and the beginning of an arc of novellas featuring everyone’s favorite monster hunter. Check it out at Amazon or wherever you buy ebooks!
Then we’ve got the print edition of Grits, Guns & Glory, Bubba Season 2. It is FINALLY on the way, thanks to the layout talents of one Matthew J. Saunders, who helped me with the interiors and did a far nicer job than I ever could. So I’ll be using him or someone like him for future self-dubbed print projects. You’ll notice that GG&G has a different cover in print than it does in ebook, and that’s all about my Photoshop limitations. The cover I made for GG&G looked decent in thumbnail size on Amazon, and it looked okay in low-res, but it looked like flaming shit when I went hi-res for printing. So I took the image from Bad Moon Rising and built a new cover around that. Sometimes the best-laid plans, and all that. But here’s the print cover, and I think it turned out okay.
There’s a LOT brewing on the audiobook front. First, all five Black Knight Chronicles books are now available on Audible, so if you’d rather listen than read, you can keep up with the adventures of Jimmy and Greg. Also, Bubba Season 1 should be available on Audible in mere days, followed shortly by Raising Hell, Harker #1. Harker #2, Harker #3, Bubba Season 2, AND Knight (un)Life, a Black Knight short story collection, are all in production. So there should be a lot of audio available between now and the first of the year.
I’m hard at work on Black Knight #6, about 2/3 of the way through the book, and I’m working on a new Harker novella for next month, so stay tuned for more releases.
by john | Oct 25, 2015 | Writing
I’m making a big push right now to be more consistent with my newsletter, add value for subscribers, and increase the readership. To that end, on Halloween (October 31 – next Saturday) I’ll be giving away a free ebook of Grits, Guns & Glory, Bubba the Monster Hunter Season 2, to one lucky mailing list subscriber. All you have to do to enter is go here, fill out the form, and then you’re on the list!
Now I’m not the first author to make a mailing list push in recent months, and I won’t be the last. The reason is, Facebook has changed their algorithms again to make it more difficult for us to stay in touch with fans. I certainly don’t begrudge FB the monetizing of their site – that’s their job. I’m simply reacting to the market and finding better ways for fans to stay in touch with me, and me to stay in touch will y’all. So please take a minute to sign up for the mailing list, I promise your name won’t be sold, and if it’s used for any big marketing thing, it’ll be something that I’m directly participating in, like a multi-author swag giveaway.
For more info on the multi-author swag giveaway, go here.
There’s also NEW Bubba coming this week, I promise!
by john | Oct 21, 2015 | Magic:the Gathering
So a lot of folks who stop by here know that I play Magic: the Gathering. A lot. Like several times a week I’m at a local game shop playing cards, and pretty much every day I’m reading articles about the game, tweaking my deck lists, checking the value of cards, swapping out good stuff for bad stuff in my trade binder, etc.
You could say I’m into the game. Just like I was into poker before this. Yes, I understand that part of my nature and continue to posit that it’s better than drugs. But really, it’s just like drugs – I spend all my money on magic and therefore I don’t have any money to buy drugs.
Since I’m only a mediocre player of the game (leave me alone, the game is complex, and I’m not really all that bright), one of my favorite things to do is trade magic cards. I also will often buy collections from people and resell them for money, or sell cards when money is tight. This post is intended to help you maximize your fun and profit without being a dick to the people you’re trying to trade with. We’ll talk a little about buying and selling, too, but mostly about trading. If you follow these simple rules, you don’t have to worry about getting ripped off, and you’ll have a better time trading.
1) Tomorrow/yesterday/next year/last year values don’t matter – In most cases, it makes no damn difference if Bonfire of the Damned was a $50 when it was legal in standard, it’s a $5 card today. Nobody cares that Snapcaster was $20 when Innistrad was in print, it’s $60 today. Prices fluctuate, and you’re trading based on the current value of the card, not the recent value or the possible potential value. Live in the now, trade in the now. The possible exception is when you’re trading new cards for old cards. Depending on how bad your trade partner wants an Unlimited Chaos Orb ($100), you might be able to get 2 Snapcaster Mages ($120) for it, because there are fewer Chaos Orbs in print that there are Snapcaster Mages. So you may be able to get a premium for older, more rare cards, but that’s typically part of what determines the market price anyway, so it’s unlikely except in extreme cases. And don’t get butthurt when you trade away a card that goes through the roof the next weekend. Yeah. maybe somebody had extra information that gave them an edge, but you’ve probably been on the other side of that experience, too. Or you will one day. It’s all one big cycle, like my buddy Richard and my Circle of Cinder Glade, where we traded the same land back and forth four times in a weekend because we needed filler for different trades.
2) It doesn’t matter what site you use for pricing. Ever. I use Star City Games because I find it easier to navigate. If you want to use TCGPlayer, that’s fine, but I’m going to make you look everything up because I find their interface clunky. As long as you are on the same page, literally, then it doesn’t matter if you use SCG, TCG, eBay or the kiosk in the local game store. Just make sure you are both on the same site, because you don’t want to be valuing your cards from a notoriously lowball site and have your trading partner value their cards from a notoriously high-dollar site. That ends in drama. And nose punching.
3) It’s okay if you don’t want anything in my binder. My binder is small, and eclectic, and it won’t hurt my feelings if you don’t want anything there. But I also do a lot of trades just for value, so if you find something, don’t be shy about asking to trade for it. We’ll find a way to get there. Last night I wanted a foil Windswept Heath ($40) off a guy at the shop. He wanted a bunch of Unglued basic lands off me ($60), so when we locked in the deal for the foil Heath, I just poked around his trade stock until I found an extra $20 to get the rest of the deal done.
4) Don’t be a dick. Don’t be that guy haggling over a quarter. Nobody cares that much over a quarter. Don’t be the guy making fun of what’s in somebody else’s binder. They might only have enough money to draft once a week, and this is their draft rares. Or maybe they just put a binder together and don’t really care about trading (I don’t understand this mindset). But basically, trading is an opportunity for social interaction, often with new people. Take the time to be nice, to be welcoming, to say something nice about their binder or cards, point out something unusual or cool that they have – a funky foil that looks really cool, or something. Make a friend. Trading is a chance to interact with other players when you’re not actively trying to beat them in a competition, so make it pleasant. And really, don’t be that guy who haggles over quarters. Usually, if I get within a dollar or two on a decent-sized trade, I’ll let the difference slide. It makes it easy, it keeps the trade from getting bogged down, and prevents a lot of hurt feelings.
5) Don’t expect retail for your shit. This is a strictly selling thing, not a trading thing, but you’re not a store, so don’t expect to get the same price as a retail store for our cards. Retail stores have overhead – rent, lights, employees, taxes, inventory and much more – that you as an individual don’t have. So most normal people, when they look to buy a card from an individual, are going to expect a discount. A steep one. Personally, if I’m paying cash for a card, I look to pay about half what I could get it from a store at. So if I’m buying Snapcasters for cash, I’m looking to pay about $30. Snapcaster is in high and consistent demand, so I’d pay $40, but that depends on the card. I’m looking for a 30-50% discount if I’m paying cash, and that will move your cards quickly and without complaint. At the very least, and this will still take you a while to move, you should be cheaper than the cheapest place to buy singles online – eBay. If you aren’t cheaper than eBay, be prepared to trade at retail, or sit on your card for a while.
There are a few tips to help you trade magic cards more effectively and enjoy the process more, and move your cards for sale more quickly. Feel free to tell me how wrong I am in the comments, I don’t really read them. 🙂
by john | Oct 17, 2015 | Writing
New Bubba is coming soon, here’s a little tiny taste that I thought was funny.
“What happened?” Skeeter asked, his voice going all high and panicky. This time I didn’t blame him. I was starting to think pretty strongly about cutting and running myself.
“Eddie just showed up.”
“Eddie the voodoo priest from last night?”
“In his butt-nekkid glory with a dozen other necked folk walking behind him chanting and glowing.”
“Did you say they were glowing, Bubba?”
“Yes, and before you ask, I only had three Hurricanes, they were half-strength and it was a couple hours ago, so yes I am sober, and yes, there are necked voodoo people walking through the cemetery glowing like somebody shoved a million candlepower flashlights up their hoo-has. Now if you will excuse me I am going to go talk to a nekkid houngan about how to get two hundred zombies back in their graves where they belong without having to shoot each and every damn one of them in the face. Wish me luck.”
“Good luck,” Skeeter said, and I clicked off my comm to go deal with the weirdest damn thing I’d seen since coming to New Orleans, and that bar was getting higher by the minute.