I’ve enrolled all the Bubba the Monster Hunter stories (except Cat Scratch Fever, because it’s new and I want you Nook owners to be able to get the story) in Kindle Select through April, and I’m going to use the month of March to work on really seeing what I can do with this program from Amazon. Now I’m no Scott Nicholson, so don’t expect me to be giving away no ten Kindle Fires or anything like that, but I do think giving away one Kindle Fire is not out of the question. So I’m working on a giveaway, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Watch this space for more details!
Here’s the schedule for the free Bubba stuff –
Monsters Beware – Free February 29-March 2
Voodoo Children – Free March 5-9
Ballet of Blood – Free March 12-16
Ho-Ho-Homicide – Free March 19-23
Tassels of Terror – Free March 26-30
And Bloggers – you can get entries just by posting, tweeting, sharing or otherwise helping publicize this giveaway!
I got my schedule this morning for StellarCon 36 in High Point, NC. It looks like a jam-packed weekend of geeky fun, so if you’re anywhere in the area, come on over and say hi! Here’s what I’m scheduled for –
Friday – 5PM – 5:30PM – Reading – I think I’ll pull out some Bubba stuff, maybe a little Black Knight stuff, and maybe even a little poetry if anybody shows up to see the reading.
Friday – 8PM – Prop Building – I’m a theatre guy, so I can talk a little about building props, but it’s not really my strong suit. This will be a rare chance to see me on a panel where I don’t talk a lot.
Saturday – 2PM – The Role of the Publisher in Today’s Market – this will not be a chance to see me be quiet. I’ll be the one championing small press and self-publishing. Should be fun. Too bad Mike Stackpole is doing an interview at this time slot, since this is kinda a hot button for him. With Misty Massey, so I’ll be polite at least. She’ll poker me if I misbehave.
Saturday – 6PM – Pushing the Limits in YA Fiction – What issues should YA lit deal with and what should the boundaries be? I feel like YA lit should deal with anything that young adults may actually have to deal with, but I’m kinda silly that way. On a panel with people who know way more about the genre than I do, like A.J. Hartley and Davey Beauchamp.
Sunday – 1PM – Where do you get your Ideas? And other stupid questions. – This oughta be entertaining
So I hope you’ll be able to come out and join me. In other news, I still have need of a minion for a couple of cons coming up this year. It’s not a paid position, but I’ll get you into cons for free. If you live somewhere that I’m going to be, and have interest in attending cons and helping out a scatterbrained author (or maybe two), let me know.
There have been a few questions posted as to when the fourth book of the Black Knight Chronicles will be out (tentatively titled Paint it Black, subject to change at any moment).
The honest answer is…I don’t know. Working with a publisher is a different beast, y’all. For the first time it’s not just my book that somebody (me) is thinking about. They’ve got a calendar, and I know Book 4 is on there, but I don’t know what the release date looks like. I know when my first draft is due (March 31). And I think that I’ll make that deadline, but it’ll be tight. I can already tell that this book will be a little darker, probably a bit longer, and will feature all your favorite characters from the first three books. I’m at around 20,000 words right now, or about 1/3 of the way through a typical Black Knight Chronicles book. And I’m not sure I’m more than 1/4 of the way through the story, so that makes me think it might run longer. But I’ve been wrong before. I thought the same thing about Knight Moves, and it ended up shorter. I’m learning a lot working with a developmental editor for the first time. She’s kicking my ass about plotting and making sure everything paces out right, that I lay the groundwork for things early in the book that I want to use later in the book, and stuff like that. So I’m getting everything out of the traditional publishing process that I’d hoped for so far. Now for the money truck to back up to my door…
But I don’t know when Book 4 will drop, and as soon as I know something, I’ll let you guys know.
What I do know is that we’ll have a new Bubba story each month (on average, I might have to double-dip in March to make up for February), and sometime in the spring we’ll have the Cindy Slaughter novel/novella. I can’t tell how long it’s going to be yet. I’m at 20,000 words in that one and have just gotten to the start of Act 2, so it might end up being a full-blown novel as well.
Then this summer I’ll have Book 2 of Return to Eden, I promise. I think that series is going to be a one book per year kinda thing, though, so it might be 2013 before I wrap it all up.
Book 5 of Black Knight Chronicles is due to Bell Bridge the end of September, so that’ll take up the summer to write, along with the Bubba stories, and I might work on Book 3 of Return to Eden when I finish it, or I might hammer on another project or two that I’ve been kicking around in the back of my head.
So while I don’t know when you’ll see the next Black Knight book, I know there will be a Bubba story this month (or two next month, I promise), the Cindy Slaughter book late spring, Return to Eden 2 in the summer, and more Bubba stories to keep you laughing at my gun porn all year round. A few people have asked if Bubba is going to get his own novel, and the answer for now is “no.” Bubba’s a fun diversion between books, and a way to blow off steam, but I haven’t built enough backstory yet for him to get his own novel. It might happen, but almost certainly not in 2012. There might be a Bubba origin story next year, but we’ll see how I feel about the Cindy Slaughter book when it’s done, and whether or not I want to play around in that universe any more.
So there’s a little ramble on what I’m working on. Currently two books at the same time, which is working well, but I don’t think I want to try to hop between three. That’s why there might not be a February Bubba story, but I’ll get back on track someday, I promise. Like in a couple weeks when I quit the day job!
In other news, I’ve decided to open Falstaff Books up to other authors. Currently I’m looking at working with playwrights, but that might broaden to general fiction writers in the future.
And no, this is not a Valentine’s Day dirty joke post. 🙂
I was sitting here looking at a blank screen thinking Shit. I have nothing new to say. So what else is new? I haven’t had anything new to say on this blog forever. I’m busy. I’m writing. I’m rehearsing. I’m writing. I’m rehearsing. Ad Nauseum.
Then it hit me – sometimes it’s not easy to write. Last night and this past weekend was a fine example of that. I wrote nothing on Friday or Saturday despite having both days off from the day job (5 weeks and counting!), but I decided that between the day job and rehearsal, I was going to give myself permission not to write if I didn’t feel like it. But Sunday that shit had to be over. I went to my parents’ to celebrate their birthdays (their birthdays are three days apart, so we celebrate them together), and got in a little writing before we left. I only got a little over a thousand words down, but it felt like I’d written 5,000 by the time I was done.
Then last night was more of the same. I wrote a little over 2,300 words, but it felt like 10,000. My writing muscles are rusty after writing practically nothing for a couple of weeks due to other commitments. But that’s kinda the deal – if you’re going to pursue this in any professional capacity, there will be days that you don’t feel like writing. Tough shit. It’s hard to sit there staring at an accusing blank screen, but that’s the job. People pay me to write things – books, stories, articles. And I love writing. But some days I just want to play Skyrim all day. And pretty soon, I won’t have anyone to answer to but myself (and my editor for some project, but usually just me and my bank account). So I’m learning to put my butt in the chair even when I don’t want to, and knock the rust off that’s built up in a month of playing theatre again. I think it will be easier to do shows when writing is my day job, and I’m not juggling three different things all at one time, but we’ll see.
Tonight is Valentine’s, so I’ll probably lose most of my writing time again, but Suzy and I have spent precious little time together this year, so it’ll be worth it. It just means I have to work that much harder Wednesday night to catch up, and to keep the rust from getting too thick on my typing fingers.
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