Busy Week

I've been quite busy and generally up to no good! Well, generally up to no good. I've begun rebuilding the Armory Games website, though it isn't quite ready for the civilian populace- yet. I'm still playing with the theme a bit, but I don't overly mind what I have already chosen for it. Once the website is fully live, I will most likely be migrating these blogs to it.

For those of you who have been following the Firestorm Game Dev blog, I'm sorry to say that the game system is going table top for the time being. There are several reasons for this, but the largest is that I can manage the entire production myself until interest ramps up. This means that the game will actually be completed.

In addition to this, the Firestorm Rules Set will be released in modern edition for free. That's right, free! So if you're interested in miniature war gaming, there is no reason not to check it out. I'll be posting a beta version of the rules in ~ a month. Less depending on how well everything fits together in this grand scheme of mine.

Work on the novel continues (though at a slower pace) and I should have it up for sale in less than 6 months. I'm also now involved in making instructional videos for home computing/networking and the like. These are basic videos meant for those with little or no knowledge of computing systems. In conjunction, I may very well be offering classes at the local libraries for the same things.

So, overall, I'm keeping rather busy. Idle hands are the devil's workshop, as they say.

Friday Post

I will be posting a new entry this Friday, as per usual. I was busy preparing for a Warhammer 40k Tourney this week, so made little headway in my writing. I'll be back on schedule Monday morning.

Chapter 1 finished

I have completed the first draft of chapter 1. I'm having certain individuals look it over for me. I think I have decided to eliminate a lot of the technology descriptions. The companion encyclopedia will not only streamline the original work, but add an additional (free!) gold mine for those who live for the technology. This will be a living, breathing document, so I will update it as future publications are completed and made available.

Though I am excited to be making progress, I am tempering this enthusiasm to make certain the proper amount of time is spent on review and improvements. As much as I want to release the book to the world, I want to do it right.

While I'm not yet prepared to start giving details about the chapters, I would like to spend a moment talking about publishing. The typical publishing process is long, tedious, and unpredictable. Authors can easily spend more than a year trying to find a suitable publisher for their book. When they do find this publisher, it will take at least another 6 months for the book to hit shelves (assuming the editor does not want sweeping changes made).

While the publisher usually advances money to the author, this money is advanced against future royalties. This means if the publisher advances $10,000, the author will need to sell $10,000 worth of royalties before they see another cent. Even with a well known publisher backing them, most authors don't sell more than a few thousand copies. This means that they don't even make back their advance. The average novel is out of print within a year of it's initial release.

Traditionally, a reputable publishing house was the only way to go. Self publishing companies (often referred to as vanity publishers) often charged a lot of money up front for a run of books. The author then had to literally sell their book door to door. Self publishing doomed any chance that a book or author had of succeeding.

This has changed dramatically in the last few years. Where mass-print publishers with an army of marketers once reigned, now stand empty buildings. The publishing houses of old are driving as fast as they can towards digital distribution. Those who refused to change are now going bankrupt. Many companies are also offering print on demand- a method of publishing that allows books to be printed as they are sold, with royalties paid to the author.

Amazon's Kindle and it's digital library make up 60% of book sales on Amazon, and a substantial portion of large retailers like Barnes and Noble. Other digital distribution companies like Scribd are seeing a massive influx of traditional publishers, who are now posting professionally published works in digital formats to save money and increase their customer base.

Considering the best deal an author can get from a traditional publisher is 15% (and that is a hard limit. You simply aren't going to earn any more), the substantial offering of 50% to 80% given by companies like Scribd and Amazon make far more lucrative prospects to Authors.

What does this mean? Well, mostly it means that publishing has become worlds easier for would-be authors. Where once they could expect only rejection letters, they now receive royalties. It also makes marketing self-published books far easier. With companies like Google and Facebook allowing cost effective advertising to millions of potential customers, the only true advantage of a publisher has been eliminated.

And to be fair, that was the only true service a publisher could offer. Writers could pay a freelance editor, cover artist, printer, and make their own website. The one thing that was of great difficulty was marketing the book to large outlets and libraries. In the digital world, everyone is equal.

There are no concerns about under printing, losing shelf space, or going out of print. Everyone has the same chance to sell. In fact, an author can discount their books substantially (heck, the publisher would only pay them a $1.50 per book anyway. Why not sell it for $2?) and severely undercut a publishing house who has substantial overhead.

While the internet is no longer a new oddity in our culture, it is still a new frontier, and an excellent place for enterprising individuals to carve a living. That is, if they know where to look and are willing to commit to hard work and constant learning. The possibilities are truly endless.

Outline

Welcome to blog update 2. I know, a new blog entry so soon? I'm going to be updating this blog every Friday for those of you who like to keep everything on a clean schedule. For those who pop in at random, come back in a week for an update.

I've completed the first draft of the outline and moved forward with the first chapter. It has been a while since I've done any creative writing (and non-technical reading, for that matter), so I felt it was necessary to gauge how well I can follow the outline before re-writing it.

So far, it seems that I am able to follow the outline without much trouble. Creating an outline is an important processes when writing a novel or series of short stories. It can become very difficult to know when to end a chapter, and how to begin another without a clear view of the big picture. It can also allow you to predetermine what is contained within each novel, creating stronger plot continuity.

But I digress. I had originally planned on writing Firestorm to fully explain the technology base of the 23rd century. I feel that this bogs down the story with mundane technical details. Instead, I will also release an encyclopedia of technology for free on Scribd.com. This allows me to focus more on character development (a much more important aspect of writing) and give gear heads additional content to read at their leisure.

That's it for this blog post. See you again next week!

Phase 1: Code Name - Firestorm

I have begun writing in earnest again, with the Firestorm universe being the most salient option at this point. I have weighed my options and currently consider digital publishing mediums such as scribd and Kindle to be the most lucrative choices. While I hold nothing against traditional publishers, I don't envy the idea of spending months on rejection letters before receiving a lukewarm entry bid at a low percentage.

I also understand that many people would prefer a physical copy to purchase, rather than depend on a digital volume that holds no resale or bookshelf value. For those, I am looking into createspace.com, a service which prints books as they are ordered at no cost to the author. This allows said authors to earn royalties without an extensive upfront cost. However, the cost of purchasing a physical copy of my literature will be 50% to 75% more than the digital copy. The price increase covers the physical material and shipping of the product, and is unavoidable.

Economics aside, I have outlined 5 of roughly 10 chapters from the first book of the Firestorm series. I'm not yet prepared to post any specifics aside from a brief synopsis as follows:

The discovery of time compression using the Gelvin theory (first published in 2190), leads to the theory that an enveloped of compressed time can be created to dramatically slow time for all those within its wake. A series of ships given the class "Einstein" test the theory, travelling from Earth to Unity Station orbiting Pluto, prove the theory works. Over the next 80 years, focus on creating ships that can generate a field large enough to cover an entire fleet commences.

In the year 2315, the population of Earth has reached a critical level. Though colonies exist within the whole of the solar system, they are underdeveloped and not yet prepared to handle the influx of potential immigrants. The discovery of the star HG5581 and it's orbiting planet (HG5581a) behind the dark nebula Hadrien impels the governments of the world to force an exodus of up to 10% of all armed forces and 10% of the general population.

By 2320, a coalition of armed forces departs 5 years before the colonists to establish a secure environment for the colonist to arrive establish a solid human empire among the stars. Both the journey and arrival of these forces is met with strife. All the hardship and suffering endured by these new arrivals is but a footnote in the vast and deep expanse of the Helix Stars and their many other inhabitants...