I have a plan

 

I'm working to "rescue" the Athena Fox series, not because I'm in love with it, but because that's six years of back catalog and having more books out there always benefits the writer. There's a lot of things to be done, which is why I wasn't able to attempt this before.

Identify market and approach with an outside advisor. I have one now and have some confidence this one will work out.

Revisions. I'm still collating notes from two beta readers and of course myself, so I can get The Early Fox fixed up. It is actually in pretty good shape but could benefit from a bit of tightening. I am rather less looking forward to working on the others, but will probably go through beta readers again; weighing the potential value of an already-written book against time that could be spent writing a better one.

Editing. Yeah, I want a human edit pass. I haven't figured out yet if I can afford it.

Possible new titles, definitely new covers to fit the identified market approach. I have a stack of Shutterstock pulls for the latter and intend to mock up my own consistent set of recovers for the whole series, then hand those off as concepts to an artist -- preferably a solo human artist, not the front end of a cover mill. Which is also expensive, and I'm on fixed income now.

A release scheme. Probably staged, under new ISBNs. I might purchase my own ISBNs this time. I'd love to do ARCs for reviews, but I don't know if I'm up for that, too.

More cooking at home, because I want to be conservative with my expenses, and I've been meaning to get back to that. But I don't want to be too ambitious with it yet. I need to clear out more space in the kitchen. And that means cooking has to stand behind general cleaning and re-organization.

I have plans but they basically require I lose from thirty to forty percent (by bulk) of what I own. I've done most of the obvious. Now it is down to sorting out old cables and electronics, clothing I don't wear, books I've been keeping in the closet...and then increasingly challenging questions, like do I want to get rid of the musical instrument parts (including a half-built ukulele)?

My hope is to lose the two big bookshelves, shift the two small bookshelves and add a matching third, both opening up more bare wall for space and light and also freeing an entire wall to rack up some musical instruments. In the kitchen, even more ambitious; completely clear one end and stick acoustic material up there so I am less self-conscious about practicing musical instruments at home.

Revisions on The Early Fox are probably going to take a week. Deliverable on the marketing plan is seven days as well. So that's probably the focus for at least a week and, especially if I get into editing and/or revisions on other books immediately, at least the rest of the month.

That thing about making a solid back-catalog is in context of writing stuff that isn't another Athena Fox adventure. I have a floating list of potential books, with two currently close to the top and ready to go.

Those two are a weird contrast. All Systems Blue (working title) is robust in the structure; technology, philosophical ideas, structures of society, etc. But as yet I've done very little on the surface look and feel.

The Tiki Stars is all about the surface. There's really nothing under it. But since the surface is so vivid and mostly already constructed for me, writing it is likely to be easier and it is also (plotting concerns aside) closer to being ready to write.

Or my marketing consultant might convince me to throw more behind Athena Fox.

(I really do want to do another American episode, specifically, a blue highway adventure; dropping off a Greyhound bus into some small town and discovering a big problem. The stumbling block is while I've thought of half of dozen plot hooks already, I can't seem to get archaeology into the mix.)

Football and Knife

I'd heard somewhere that it had been suggested there be a pistol in the Nuclear Football, so before "pressing the red button" and killing millions, the President would have to look one man in the eye and kill him.

Well, turns out the original story is weirder. Roger Fisher, of Harvard Law School and a major thinker in Conflict Management, suggested in the March 1981 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, that this be implemented -- in the form of an implanted capsule containing the launch codes, and a butcher knife. The President would have to gut one of his own aides in order to launch those weapons.

That is way too good not to be in the novel. Not because it is a strikingly weird tidbit of history, but because that tension between the remote-control deaths of millions and the twist of a knife up close is what drives the central conflict and resolution of the book.

Anyhow. My knee didn't reach football size, but I had an episode of cellulitis that got caught maybe twenty-four hours before the danger window. Spend two days in hospital getting antibiotics on an IV drip. That, and still being on oral antibiotics and a tight Ace bandage wrap, means I haven't been up for getting my place straightened up properly.

Now that I'm retired and all. Not that I've exactly stopped working. My old work has had me on the phone or coming down to drop off keys for at least a week, they still have me on the roster as a consultant, and I interviewed to light Earnest in July.

So I guess this blog is coming back into its name. I'll be doing theatre again. And I'll be on a more limited budget.

So I've been poking around at new writing projects, plans to go forwards, market analysis...and I'm finally ready to go hit the revisions on The Early Fox. Or The Drake Equation, which is a problem I'm looking at seeing if Fiverrr can help with. Should I re-stage? Probably. Should I extensively revise? Probably not. Should I re-name? I...don't know.

My confidence in Fiverrrrr is low at the moment. I started looking at the beta readers, and one that jumped out advertised: "I will a service of beta reading." Clicking on the details, she claims to be an English speaker, and goes on to inform that, "Over the years, Ive developed a sharp, detail-oriented eye..." 

Ah, yes. Details other than apostrophes.

As usual, it is a futile project. What I want is someone to A) look at the series as currently presented at KDP, including reading sample chapters, B) confirm or disagree with my current understanding of the correct market, and C) give an opinion on changing the titles.

What I am looking at is people who want me to define genre and hand them all the operational keywords, at which point they will then as efficiently as possible (quite possibly using AI) throw into some boiler-plate blurbs and SEO. With this desire of theirs for maximum return and minimum variation strongly supported by a vendor (Fiverrrr) framework that wants to turn every transaction into a Set Menu.

At least one thing is solved. I have a basic idea for new covers for the whole series, and I've started hauling assets into Affinity Photo. I'll rough them up, then go out to a proper cover artist (possible Miblart again) for a package deal of taking my mock-up and doing their magic on it.