Reductions

Fox and Hounds has finally gotten to the point where I'm thinning the cast instead of adding new bodies. I used to love this point when mixing microphones on stage musicals; "Oh, he's left the stage, and I'll never need his mic again for this performance."

Just wrote the good-bye scene for the Nine Elms dig. So Tim and Tony, Stu, Hanif, Susan Morris, and Frank/Joe have all said their last line and have left the stage. So has Leslie Cuvier, although Steve is going to be around for a little yet. Probably. I'll see.

Of course the previous chapter I got to let go of Cynth, Cephrin, and Petrichor. But they were all introduced in the same chapter, as part of the Battersea Power Station hack. Which also finally brought the much-talked-about Guy on stage at last.

***

I've been thinking again about the numbers game. There's a lot that I should be doing as a writer, but that doesn't currently make sense as an author. Spending the time to grow my craft. Editing, beta readers. Time in research and in careful writing.

The numbers game says you need enough titles to get the snowball effect to start. It is tough finding your audience (or, rather, helping them find you). I finally have a review -- it is by a family friend but especially as she's been out of communication for decades I think it achieves a sufficient degree of separation.

More reviews would be good. They don't even have to be positive. A book without reviews looks suspicious somehow. And once again it is a circle game; reads get reviews gets reads. And reads gets placement gets views gets reads.

The simplest hack at my level is the series. The advantage over multiple stand-alone books is that people tend to read a series through; if they read one, they'll read them all. Plus, a lot of people are looking for the long read and they are more likely to take a chance on a series.

So that means that, paradoxically, the best thing to do is to slam another novel or two or three without even taking time to do them right...or spending any money on professional editing. Because all of that only makes sense once I've started to achieve an audience.

(Assuming that actually happens.)

***

But all this might change. Everything we are doing these days is an exercise in assuming the old rules hold, or will become true again "when this blows over." History says...more or less. History has been changed by plague, not just slowed down. Already we are seeing signs that work-from-home has gotten a new life (lets see how long it lasts this time) and Amazon has jumped ahead in the battle against brick-and-mortar (since they didn't have the robust delivery systems in place).

And that's before you get to BLM.

So that's one more thing that makes me feel like it is a futile exercise when I go to the blank paper. The publishing industry has changed once again. And the world is changing. The specific questions I was talking about in terms of CRM or...well, anyhow.

***

Spent yesterday with painfully swollen lymph nodes. Recovering now, so was almost certainly a bug but probably not the worrying one. Probably. I made it a point to stay tucked away in my shop in the back of the building all day, and I might call in sick tomorrow.

***

And now trying to work out the "pants" scene.

This is a problem scene. Possibly problematic. Way back when I was brainstorming I thought of Penny getting put up at Graham's flat when she can't find an affordable hotel. And I dreamed up a couple of funny bit for the being uncomfortable and being acerbic and still working their way through how this friendship of theirs works.

Well, several months and a detailed outline later and this is part of a key scene in that friendship arc. It is the last blow-up they get before the big one, and there's no follow-up after that one.

So what was light-hearted fun is just playing wrong.

Right. Just outlined how I'm going to handle the conversation. As light-hearted verbal jousting that accidentally veers into innuendo that was possibly intentional but in any case is merely an alias for a larger discussion to take full shape in a later scene...

Oh, that sounds easy to write!