by john | Oct 18, 2012 | Travel
So here’s where I actually bitch and moan about NYCC, the Javits Center, New York City, and major metro areas that have no idea how to host a real convention.
In my other life I went to a lot of conventions. Some of them, like the NC Theatre Conference, were very small, maybe a couple hundred people some years. Those have certain challenges to organizers, but once you find a venue, the attendees pretty much have no idea that there are any issues. Some were large, like Lighting Dimensions International (I wave hello to my lighting industry friends who are gathering in Vegas this weekend). These conventions have their own issues, and it doesn’t take much to make them noticeable, because any glitch will affect thousands, or tens of thousands of people. Then there are the huge shows, like the National Association of Broadcasters show, which fills the entire Las Vegas Convention Center every year. These have no room for error, because they are on the biggest stage. NY Comic Con is that kind of size. The size that if there’s anything off or goofy, it could affect the population of a small city.
Like I said, I’ve been to a lot of conventions in a lot of places, and I’ve seen some towns that really understand how to host a convention. Las Vegas and Orlando really understand what it takes to host a convention.
New York City has no clue.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate New York. I wouldn’t want to live there for very long, I don’t like cold weather and I don’t like crowds that much. But I like New York. And going into this adventure I figured it would be no huge hassle to get everything loaded in, loaded out, make commerce happen, what have you.
That was when I assumed New York knows how to host a major convention.
I think I know why NYC doesn’t understand how to host a major con or trade show – population density. If there were 110,000 people at NYCC, probably 80,000 of them were from the greater NYC area. If there are 90,000 people attending NAB in Las Vegas, 80,000 of them were from outside the Las Vegas metro area.
This lack of outside guests means that New York doesn’t have one of the most important things any city must have for a convention center – a convention hotel. I’ve never been to a convention center anywhere in the US where there isn’t a hotel within a short walk. And I don’t mean a New York short walk, I mean a Kansas short walk. More than two blocks is not a short walk. And there’s no major hotel near the Javits Center. None.
There’s also no subway stop close by. The nearest subway station is right outside Penn Station, which is about 3/4 of a mile away. Not a huge deal under normal circumstances, unless you’ve been standing on concrete in boots all day, or are wearing an elaborate costume, or are just friggin’ tired, or want to start your day at a con looking fresh! Yeah, yeah, I know – there’s one under construction. But here’s the thing – the Javits Center ain’t exactly new! It’s been open almost 30 years!
Then there are the cabs. Yeah, I know, take a taxi. Sure – if they’ll stop. There was no cab stand outside the main exit for the convention center, and none of the cabs we saw in the evenings outside the convention center were on duty. Contrast this with the Las Vegas Convention Center, where there are huge lines of cabs with cab attendants pairing people up to cab share so the lines move more quickly and people can save cash on cabs.
All of these things combined to make Comic Con just a less pleasant experience than it could be if it weren’t in one of the largest cities in the US. In almost any other city, the influx of 100,000 people for one event would get the entire city’s attention. Red carpets would be rolled out, cheap hotel rooms would be flowing like water, and every cabbie in the city would be salivating at all those tourist dollars. In New York, they call that Tuesday.
So until there’s a convention hotel near the Javits, or a subway stop right outside, or someone is willing to foot my bill for cab and car fare all weekend, I’ll be sticking to the smaller cons. Like Dragon*Con, which only has 50-60,000 people. 🙂
I am planning my convention schedule for 2013, so if you’ve got a great con in your area that you’d like to see me at, drop me a line and we’ll see what we can do.
by john | Oct 16, 2012 | Appearances, Comics, Travel
Because when there’s over 100,000 frigging people at a convention, it gets more than one post! And yes, there will be photos. And yes, most of them will be of hot chicks in skimpy outfits.
Let’s start with a quick overview. If you’ve been to many fandom-based conventions, like MidSouth Con, ConCarolinas, even Dragon*Con, you ain’t seen nothing like Comic Con. It’s way more of a trade show than a con. What I mean by that is that people mostly buy their Comic Con tickets for the exhibit hall and the autographs, and the panels are kind of an afterthought. There were exhibits from Xbox, Marvel, DC, Legendary Pictures, Dark Horse, Chevrolet, Craftsman Tools.
Yeah, I said Chevy and Craftsman had booths at Comic Con. Now do you get what I mean by this was a trade show and not a normal con? Craftsman paid someone to write and draw and custom comic book with their superhero in it to promote their Bolt-On series of tools.
Take a minute and go there. The first time I saw “Bolt-On Tool” I went there. Couldn’t help it.
So it was a very different environment for me than most cons. I kinda knew what to expect, having done the Heroes Con for a couple of years. But this was way, WAY bigger. Like 4X bigger. And that meant that it was easy to miss stuff, like a small book booth. Or like Artists’ Alley, which I never set foot in all weekend. Or the panel rooms, which I never saw.
And missed out on a chance to meet Kim Harrison, which was a bummer. But there will be other cons, and hopefully she will attend some of them. But I did see Richard Kadrey and had a nice chat with him on Sunday, so that was nice.
But I sold almost everything I took with me. I had about a dozen books left when the show was over, so that was good. I was mostly pushing the Black Knight Omnibus, because it’s new and shiny. And looks amazing!
I took 50 copies of the omnibus with me, and sold 40 of them. I sold out of Genesis and The Chosen, and had 2 copies of Bump in the Night left at the end of the weekend. So it was a good weekend for sales. I even sold a couple of Read Recklessly t-shirts!
But I won’t be doing NY Comic Con again any time soon.
It’s a really expensive show, because everything in New York is expensive. And it’s not a wonderfully organized show, and there aren’t really very many opportunities for me to really connect with fans, other than pitching them a book. And while that’s fun, it’s not as much fun as sitting on a bunch of panels and talking about the craft.
And I’m trying to cut back (a little bit) on the number of shows I do. I’m already committed to nine cons next year, with a couple of other maybes, and that’s a bunch. It gets expensive, and while some of the cons I can split rooms with folks and ride share for gas, I can’t always count on that. The only way I was able to afford NYCC was because my awesome friend Tamsin let me sleep in her spare room for the weekend and shepherded me around the subway. Otherwise it would have cost half again as much as Dragon*Con!
But I had a good time. I met some awesome folks, a couple of whom have already dropped me a line on Facebook or email, so I hope I can get scheduled into some smaller con in the Northeast soon. Just not a con with 100,000 people. That’s way too big for this old country boy!
But check out some of the costumes! 
by john | Oct 8, 2012 | Real Life
I has it. I’ve been called on it more than once in my internet life, but it’s too late to stop now, methinks. So if you’re not interested in learning way too much about the mental state of your favorite redneck urban fantasy author, you should click over to something else.
Still here? Sick voyeurs, aren’t you?
Well, here’s the reason my word count has sucked for the last six weeks – I’ve been depressed.
Simple as that.
Nope, no good reason, no inciting incident, nothing has gone off the rails terribly, in fact a lot of things have gone right for me lately.
It doesn’t matter.
You see, for those of you who haven’t dealt with it, depression isn’t sadness. Sadness typically has a reason behind it. “My cat died – I’m sad.” “I lost my job – I’m worried and sad.” “A schoolbus ran over my foot – I’m cursing in pain and I’m sad because now there’s blood all over my new shoes.”
Depression doesn’t need a reason, it invents them.
I only sold two thousand books last month, I must be worthless.
I didn’t get the lead in the play I auditioned for, I’m a terrible actor.
I only brought in an extra thousand dollars working crew for the DNC, I’m a terrible provider.
Please note that all of those statements are actually good things – but depression takes the good things in your life and spins them into crap.
Instead of thinking “I got cast in a play in only my second audition this year. The cast is great, the parts I got are awesome, and I’m having a lot of fun working with this team.” I got spun into other crap. For the record, I am in a play. The cast is great. I didn’t get the lead, but I’m the wrong age and race for the leads, and the parts I have are awesome and I’m having a blast in the show.
But depression lies. It’s a lying liar and it lies.
I know this. I’ve battled depression since high school. And I’ve always won. You know how I know I’ve won?
I’m still here.
My uncle battled depression. He lost. I miss him.
So I’ve spent the last month or so in a funk of not much activity, not much writing, not much promotion, not much of anything except going to a few rehearsals, teaching a few classes, and generally muddling through. I managed to shower most days. I managed to not fight with my wife more than once most days. I managed to do the bare minimum to keep moving forward and meet most of my responsibilities most days.
Which means that I won. Again. I started to feel myself pulling out of it a few days ago, and I can only imagine that it’s like getting pulled out of quicksand. The huge sucking weight of it wants to pull you back in, but you fight it, and you pull. I’m not back to normal yet, but I’ve had enough practice dealing with this bullshit that you’ll never know it on the street or hanging out with me in a bar.
I’ve dealt with my depression this way for most of 25 years now. I muddle through until eventually it passes. This was a medium-length episode, about six weeks. The longest one lasted for most of 2002. The worst ones were back in high school, when it felt so dead inside that I cut myself to remind me what feeling something felt like. I’m happy to say I haven’t done that in two decades.
I deal with my depression by reading. I deal with it by talking about other crap on the internet to people. I deal with it my way, but mostly by just putting one foot in front of the other.
I didn’t post this to be some kind of inspiration to others. Most folks with depression have it way worse than me. And if you’re feeling bleak, like nobody gives a shit and nothing matters, if you can’t hear the truth of the world through the lies that your mind is telling you – get help. Find somebody that makes it worth moving forward for. Find the person or thing that makes it worth putting one foot in front of the other for.
Mine’s cooking lunch right now, so I’m going to go be with her. Because I won. Again. And I’ll keep winning.
And my prize for winning this time is a trip to New York Comic Con. Come out and say hello at Booth #2167. I’ll be there all weekend!
by john | Oct 5, 2012 | Appearances, Real Life, Travel
I’m here. I know, I start a lot of posts that way, don’t I? I haven’t been on here in a while because I’ve been swamped in my new obsession, Magic:The Gathering. And I’ve been using that to distract me from some other issues, namely dismal book sales numbers for the past six weeks. Things have been bad since the middle of August and I’m hoping they pick up, otherwise I’m looking for a McJob to fill the gap come the first of the year. That wouldn’t necessarily be the worst thing in the world, but it wouldn’t be a whole lot of fun, either.
But on the bright side, the Omnibus is out, in print and on Kindle. It will be hitting the Nook and all other ebook formats soon, just waiting for it to get processed. You can order it from Amazon here, or if you’re going to be in the Big Apple next weekend, come by Booth #2167 at the Javits Center and say hi. I’ll be up there with my friend Tamsin for NY Comic Con. This is my first time hitting that show, and I’m very excited. And a little terrified.
I’ve been teaching workshops each weekend on writing and publishing, and that’s been a lot of fun. My classes are getting larger and larger enrollment, and that’s good, since I get paid on a tuition split :). The classes have been getting favorable reviews, too, so if you’re in the Charlotte area, come on out and spend a Saturday morning with me! Tomorrow I’m teaching marketing and self-promotion for writers. And now I’ve got to get back to writing the outline for that class, so I gotta boogie.
by john | Sep 25, 2012 | Uncategorized
Yep, the omnibus is finally here! And for just nine bucks, you can download the first three Black Knight Chronicles books. These are heavily revised editions, re-worked with a lot of extra details, better character development, all that good stuff. Think of it as “the author’s preferred edition.”
No, you don’t have to buy them all over again.
It’s not that I don’t want all my readers to read these new versions, but it would be pretty rude of me to make you pay twice for a book you’ve already bought, wouldn’t it? So here’s the plan – within a few days I will upload the revised editions to Amazon in the individual books. If you’ve already bought the Black Knight novels, all you’ll need to do to get the new editions is delete the old file from your kindle, and download it again. The new download will be the new books, and you’ll get the revised editions without having to pay for the books again.
This will only work on Amazon, and will only work on ebooks. I can only manipulate the universe in so many ways, sorry. But since the vast majority of my readers have bought the book on Kindle, this should get 95% of you the revised books at no cost.
It won’t hurt my feelings if you go out and buy the omnibus, but you don’t have to. Welcome to the digital world.
In other news, I had a great time teaching my Next Step publishing class last Saturday at Carolina Learning Connection, and am offering a new set of Writer Services as an outgrowth of that class and the Self-Publishing class I’ve taught a few times. If you’re a writer and are looking for developmental editing/book doctoring or just need someone to help with ebook creation and upload, click the tab for “Writer Services” at the top of the page.
And if you’re interested in learning more about Self-Publishing or Marketing for Authors, check out my other classes at Carolina Learning Connection.
