Category: Dead Moon

July 10, 2019 / 7 Comments

FAQ the XIIIth: Jason Takes Manhattan

Another six months have passed us by and I promised I’d update this when there’s some more news soooooooo…. Updates!

For those of you just joining our show (already in progress)… One aspect of being an almost semi-famous author on social media is getting asked questions. Which is overall fun and I enjoy hearing from folks. But a lot of these questions come up frequently You could even go so far as to say they’re… frequently asked questions.

Sad truth is this can get exhausting—and a little frustrating—to answer the same questions again and again and again. Between this blog, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook… well, it adds up to a lot of people asking the same questions. And that’s with some version of this FAQ pinned to the top of all my social media pages!

(And before you panic, person who asked a question yesterday, no, I’m not singling you out. You just did it this one time without thinking. You’re good)

(I’m talking about that other guy. You know who I mean. We’re all thinking it, I’m just the one saying it…)

Anyway… rather than get testy and frustrated ‘cause someone asked the same question I already answered twice this morning in the same thread, I’ll just scribble up answers to a dozen of the most common questions I get and pin them on a lot of my social media pages. Then when people ask me the same question again anyway, I can say “check out that FAQ pinned at the top of the page!”

Or maybe I won’t say anything, cause look—there’s an FAQ pinned right at the top of the page!

1) So, hey, when are we going to see something new?

Well hopefully a lot of you checked out Dead Moonback at Valentine’s Day. It’s my kinda fun and pulpy sci-fi horror story about zombies on the Moon and some other things. It was exclusive with Audible and on August 14th it’ll be available as an ebook (with a little extra material) through most of your favorite booksellers.

Early next year (2020), will be Terminus. Exact date still pending. And possibly the title but I think we’re all 83% sure this is going to be it. It’s a Threshold book, and the story of a more-or-less regular guy named Murdoch who’s trying to deal with his childhood sweetheart, Anne, coming back into his life. He also has to deal with her Family… which is technically his Family, too. There’s a guy name Chase who’s, ironically, on the run from something. And there’s also Seth, Doug, Barnabus, Katanga, and some other names you may recognize, as well. It’s also going to be another Audible-exclusive (the final one). I’ll talk about that down below, if you care why.

I’m also talking with some folks about a sort of bonus-collector’s edition thing that may interest some of you. More news on that as it firms up.

If all goes well, by the time you read this I’ve finallysat down to start writing a new standalone book I’ve been wanting to do for about two years now. If everything goes perfect it might be out next year but… I guess we’ll see. And after that I might try something I’ve wanted to do for… wow, maybe a decade now?

And after that… who knows.

2) Wait, no paper version of Dead Moon?
Alas, not in the immediate future. There’s a couple of different reasons for it, and they involve a lot of business stuff I’d rather not get into at the moment. There’s a chance it may still become available, but for the moment it’s just going to be ebook alongside the audio. Sorry.

And I don’t know about Terminus yet, just to answer that one now. It’s still pretty far out.

3) Will there be another book set in the Threshold series?

… I just answered this question.

This is what I was talking about! You’re not even reading this, are you? Come on! I wrote all these out. You could at least do more than just skim.

Jeeeeesh…

4) Okay, explain this whole “Threshold” thing you keep talking about?

“Threshold” is the overall, umbrella label for the shared universe I kinda-sorta inadvertently kicked off eight years ago when I wrote 14. There are some books that are definitely part of an overall linear story, a “series” if you will, and some that just fall under the umbrella. Every Marvel movie is part of the MCU, but not every Marvel movie is a direct sequel to TheAvengers. Or if you prefer, lots of Stephen King books tie into the Dark Tower mythology, but they’re not all part of the Dark Tower series. Does that make sense?

And, yes, this does make things a bit awkward, because I know the marketing folks are reeeeeaally pushing Threshold as a pure, straightforward series (Book One, Book Two, etc), even though I’ve said several times that it isn’t. This may give some people false expectations for what some books will be about, and I apologize if that’s you. I’m doing my best to make the books as great as they can be, and hopefully you won’t be too bothered that maybe you went in expecting Avengers: Endgame and you ended up getting Spider-Man: Far From Home. Again, if that makes sense.

As a name, Threshold fits in a few different ways. It’s part of a doorway, and doorways figure big into most of this series. It also refers to reaching a certain critical level—another recurring issue in these stories. And, finally, it’s also a reference to an old H.P. Lovecraft short story. Which has absolutely nothing to do with anything, but I thought it was cool…

5) How does Dead Moon fit into the Threshold series?

As it happens, I wrote a whole book explaining this. Check out #1 up above.

(also, please read this)

6) Why do you keep doing these “Audible exclusives” ?

Well, first off, I’ve only done two, and that’s counting Terminus coming out this fall. Second, there’s a very solid argument to be made that the majority of my fanbase is audiobook listeners. Odd, I know, but there it is. Audible knows this, too, and because of this they made me an extremely generous offer for exclusive rights to Dead Moon and Terminus, meaning both of them would be audiobook only for the first six months they’re out. As I mentioned above, for Dead Moon that exclusivity ends on August 14th. For Terminus, it should be next summer (I can’t say exactly because we don’t have a release date nailed down).

And, yeah, I know this makes some of you grind your teeth. I’m sorry if you’re not an audiobook listener and this leaves you out of the loop for a bit. My agent and I talked about it a lot, believe me (even with that generous offer). Every other day on the phone for about six weeks. In the end, I really wanted to tell these stories and this was the best way I’d get to do it. Again, I’m sorry if this puts you in a bad spot.

7) Is Ex-Isle the last Ex book?

Not absolutely 100% sure, but… yeah, it looks that way.

The truth is, every series has a limited life. Very few people start on book three—they go back and start at book one. So book one of a series always sells the best, not as many people show up for book two, even less show up for book three, and so on (I just learned that in comics they call this “standard attrition”). It’s a near-constant downward slope heading for that red line where things aren’t profitable. None of the Ex-Heroes books have ever lost the publisher money (thank you all for that), but the margin kept shrinking and things didn’t look great for book six as far as that red line’s concerned.

Again, not 100% sure, but we’re in the high 90s. A number of things could make the series surge in popularity and get the publisher interested in putting out another book or two. But for now, Ex-Tensionis going to stay on that back burner. Sorry.

8) Have you considered a Kickstarter or a GoFund me to continue the Ex series?

I have and the answer’s no, sorry. I love these books. Hopefully you all know that. St. George, Stealth, and the other folks at the Mount (and your love for them) got me where I am today. I’m still amazed there are so many fans who feel so passionately about them. I had tons of fun writing them.

But… the simple truth is, if there were enough people willing to pay for another book, the publisher would be willing to put out another book. All the numbers say that’s just not the case. Sure, some folks might pay twice as much into a Kickstarter for one more book, but I think we can all agree experience says three or four times as many people wouldn’t pay anything. There’s pretty much no way this works out. Again… that downward slope I mentioned in #7.

Plus, my schedule’s set up months in advance. As I hinted at above, I already have a pretty good idea what projects I’m going to be working on until sometime in 2021 at this point. Doing a crowdfunded project means I haveto plan on said crowdfunding succeeding and work it into my schedule… which then means a gaping hole in my schedule when it doesn’t succeed.

Again, sorry.

9) Do you make more money if I buy your books in a certain format?

I know this sounds like an easy question, but there’s about a dozen conditionals to any answer I give. Figure a huge chunk of each contract is just all the different terms and conditions for when and if and how people get paid.

For example… format matters, sure, but so does whereyou bought the book. And when you bought it. And how many people bought it before you. And if it was on sale. And who was holding the sale. And all of this changes in every contract. What’s true for, say, The Fold may not be true for Paradox Bound.

TL;DR—just buy the format you like.

10) Do you have any plans to attend ########-Con?

To be honest, last year was such a mad jumble with working on books and going to cons and moving that… well, I didn’t make a hell of a lot of plans for this year. At the moment, the only thing on my schedule for the rest of the year is SDCC next week. Absolutely nothing else.

I am cautiously hoping next year will get me to a couple cons across the country. Maybe ECCC, Phoenix, DragonCon, and possibly Denver or NYCC. I’d love to do something out in New England. If any of these sound good to you, or you want to see me at your local con, please let them know. Yeah, them, not me. I’m willing to go almost anywhere I’m invited, but if I’m not invited… well, there’s just not much I can do. So, email them, tweet them, post on their Instagram account. Reach out and let your voice be heard.

And keep in mind, too, that most cons finalize their guest list at least four or five months in advance, so if your local con’s in three weeks… the odds are not in our favor. Sorry.

11) When are you going to make a movie/ TV series/ cartoon/ graphic novel/video game of your books?

Alas, I have zero say in whether or not SyFy wants to do an Ex-Heroesseries or Lifetime does a Lycanthrope Robinson Crusoe movie. They look for things that have piqued a certain level of interest, and so far these stories of mine haven’t quite scraped that threshold.

No, me (or you) writing the screenplay won’t make a difference, unless your name happens to be Shane Black, James Gunn, or David Koepp—and even then it’s not a sure thing. Because in case you forgot…

12) Didn’t you have a series deal?
Yeah, in theory. I struck a deal a few years back with Team Downey, the production company of that guy we all know from Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Turned out he’s a fan of 14and he wanted to do something with it.

Alas, there are no sure things when it comes to Hollywood. It’s a big game of if. If a pilot gets greenlit, if it gets shot, if it turns out okay, if the assorted executives like it, if it gets picked up. And a lot of these ifs are happening on a time limit. In the end… time just ran out. Which all kinda goes with what I said up above in #11. Robert Downey, Jr. had signed on as an executive producer and that still wasn’t enough to get the show made. But I get to say he liked one of my books.

And who knows what could happen in the future.

13) So, is there anything we can do to help?

Well, buying books is always a good step. Hollywood likes to see big sales numbers and interest. If you want to see something—anything—on the air, talk about it a lot on social media. Write reviews on websites. Producers/ directors/ actors all hear about this stuff the same way you do. If #ParadoxBoundor #DeadMoon start trending on Twitter tomorrow, there’ll probably be a film deal within a week.

(true fact—an easy way to help do this? Don’t buy books from Amazon. Write reviews there, sure, absolutely, but Amazon gets iffy with sales figures, so they don’t get included in a lot of bestsellers lists. Yeah, a purchase from your local bookstore might cost a buck or three more, but it’s a purchase Hollywoodis more likely to notice)

(Plus, now you’re one of those cool people supporting local businesses. So be cool.)

14) Why don’t you like people talking about your books?

To be honest, I’m still thrilled people talk about anything I wrote. Seriously. What I can’t stand are spoilers. That’s why I avoid those questions and/or comments in interviews, ignore them on Twitter, and why I try to delete any posts that reveal information from the back half of a book (yep, that’s probably what happened to your post). And not just my stories! You shouldn’t mess up other stories, either. Movies, TV—if you enjoyed it, try to give other people a chance to enjoy it the same way. I still haven’t watched the last season of Game of Thrones or Doctor Who, dammit!

15) Will you read my story and tell me what you think?

Short answer… no.

Part of this is a time issue. If I say yes to some folks, in the spirit of fairness I have to say yes to everyone. Now I’m spending all my time reading and doing critiques instead of writing. I don’t want sound mercenary, but… writing is how I pay my mortgage. So when someone asks me to read stuff, they’re asking me to give up a few hours of work. Plus, I do have this ranty writing blog sitting right, y’know, here with over a decade of advice and tips.

It’s also a legal thing. Some folks are lawsuit-crazy, and the bad ones ruin it for everyone else. Say Wakko gives me a piece of fanfic to read where he has Harry and Eli showing up at a certain post-apocalyptic film studio. A few years from now, I decide to do a big crossover book. And then Wakko sues me for stealing his ideas.

Yeah, I know that sounds stupid, but seriously, I’ve been subpoenaed and deposed over a case with less behind it than that. This is why I’m verrrry leery when I get a long message along the lines of “You know what you should really do next with the people from 14…” It’s why some writers respond with smackdowns or even legal action when they get sent stuff like this.

So, the long answer is also… no. And if you send stuff without asking, I’ll delete it unread, just like spam mail. Sorry.

16) What’s up with–wait, sixteen? You said top twelve. Wasn’t this supposed to be over by now?
Jeeeeez, do you have any idea how often I get that question…?

It’s bonus material. You got the deluxe BluRay version. Just be happy about it.

17) What’s up with your Facebook page?

Man. Facebook. What a mess, huh?

Simple truth is, Facebook’s made it pretty much pointless to have a fan page. They’ve tweaked their algorithms so my posts there have gone from 70-85% engagement to barely scraping 15-20% most of the time. Why? Well, so I’ll pay to reach people who’ve already said they want to see my posts.

And yeah, sure–it’s their site. They can do whatever they want with it and run it the way they like. And yeah they absolutely deserve to make money off it. I’m a progressive, but I still believe in (regulated) capitalism.

But then that brings us to all Facebook’s little side ventures. Which all seem to boil down to the buying and selling of… well, us, at the core. As many folks have pointed out, Facebook’s real product is us. Their real customers are the people buying as much about us as they possibly can. Maybe I’m old fashioned, but when someone talks casually about buying and selling people… it makes me uncomfortable.

So I’ve scaled way, way back on Facebook. Personally and professionally. I have no plans to change this in the near future. Sorry.

18) What about Twitter or Instagram?

Instagram (also @PeterClines) is probably the geekiest of my social medias. How is that possible, you ask? Well, there’s little toy soldiers, LEGO, classic toys. And cats. Can’t have an Instagram account without cats. Sometimes these things mix.

Yeah, I know Instagram’s also owned by Facebook, but (for the moment) they’re not being quite so reprehensible over there. So (also for the moment) I’ll still be there.

And I think that should answer about 90% of your questions, yes…?

March 13, 2019

This Little Piggy Went to Market

A couple folks have asked me questions related to marketing over the past few weeks, so I thought it’d be worth going over a couple things about this.
There’s a wonderful Richard Matheson quote that Jonathan Maberry related to me a few years back. If you’ve gone to either of the SoCal Writers Coffeehouses and listened to us speak (well, Jonathan speaks, I kinda babble on a lot until I run out of breath), you’ve probably heard it three or four times. Writing is art, publishing is the business of selling as many copies of that art as possible.

Marketing, big surprise, is part of publishing. It’s a very necessary part of publishing, whether I’m doing it myself, with a small press, or I’m the favorite author at a Big Five imprint. It’s how people discover I’ve got something to sell.

Marketing can take a lot of forms. It’s everything from me posting the new cover on Twitter to your book being plastered on the side of a bus. It’s the copy on the back of the book and me summing it up in two lines for you at a convention.

But the sole point of it, in all these examples, is to sell books.

And sometimes… this can create some conflicts with the art side.

As we move forward here, I’m sure some folks may try to read into this. It isn’t a subtweet or an angry rant. I’m not calling anyone out or absolving anyone of blame or any of that. I’m just tossing out some facts. Publishing is a business, and if I want to be successful in that business (and avoid a ton of stress), it helps to understand how it works.

Also, I know there’s a fine line between marketing and publicity and I always mess it up, so please forgive me if I weave back and forth across that line once or thrice here. I don’t think I’m ever going to end up in the other lane, but we may hear those bumpy lane divider once or thrice.

Okay, so, if marketing is getting people to buy my book, how do I do that? I can tell them the genre and see if it’s something they like. Maybe the type of characters I use. I can point out other books like it, or other storylines it may tie into. I can even offer little summaries or excerpts to tease potential readers with. Doesn’t this sound like a creepy/sexy/amazing/funny story? You saw the dragon, right? You know you like dragons. And this one’s got a lightsaber. Trust me, The Jedi of Krynn is the book you’ve been waiting your whole life for.

But seriously…

One of the big challenges here—the conflict between art and business—is how much do we tell? How do we find that fine line between getting the sale and keeping the book enjoyable? Tell too much and now all the book’s punch is already out there. Don’t tell enough and… well, maybe nobody reads it at all.

Do I mention every character in the book, even if some are supposed to be surprises? Should I mention the big twist? Should I hint at it? Heck, sometimes even just naming the genre can be a bit of a spoiler. And every spoiler saps a little bit of the story’s power… which lessens the chances for word-of-mouth sales. Now my cool novel is just kind of a bland book with no real surprises in it.
Sometimes what seem like simples questions can cause marketing headaches. For example…

(Some minor MCU spoilers coming at you)

Does Ant Man & The Wasp tie into Avengers: Infinity War?

Simple question, right? But how do you answer it? If I say no, there’s a bunch of people who might skip it. Plus, I’m lying, which people will then call me out for and complain about. If I say yes, people complain because… well, 99.5% of the film doesn’t tie in at all. And that last half a percent… well, if I’m saying yes, I’m kinda spoiling that super-powerful reveal, aren’t I? There really isn’t a good way to answer it.
Of course, even not answering it at all can cause problems, because then people will speculate around that sort of “negative space” left by the non-answer. They’ll read into things, make assumptions, and develop expectations. And these expectations will either be correct, in which case… well, they’re acting like spoilers again. Or they’re incorrect, and now people are upset because the expectations they went in with aren’t being met, no matter what the actual story is (or how good it is).

There’s another angle here, too. One you’ve probably heard before. People like series. They like them a lot, if you look at sales records. To be honest, publishers like them, too. Editors love to see a new book with series potential. And spin off potential. And tie-in potential.

But here’s another catch. People want to know how all this stuff fits together. They want to know if something is canon or set on Earth-23 or Earth 15 but stillcanon or does this involve Wakko before or after his cybernetic upgrades? Because let’s face it—there’s no point reading any of the stories before he became bionic, right? Why even bother?

So when things don’t fall into a neat A-B-C, 1-2-3pattern, it’s not unusual for marketing to just… well, kind of wing it. Like, okay, how would you number the Star Wars films (or all the novelizations and spin off books)? By the order they came out? That won’t make much sense. By the order they fit in the story? That means A New Hope: Episode IV is actually movie six. And how does that work if they do a new prequel story? Do we re-number everything? Do we just number some things but not others? I saw the novelization of Rogue One listed once as Star Wars: Book 18, and I have no clue what that’s supposed to mean.

Sure, we could leave them unnumbered but… well, that could cost sales, too. Some folks don’t like reading a series until it’s done, and if I don’t say it’s a trilogy or whatever, well… maybe they’ll never pick it up at all. So I probably need some kind of designation if I want these to sell, right?

Or do I?

Plus… sometimes explaining where things fit in can be a spoiler. We thought this story was in the future, but it’s actually in the past. We thought it was here on Earth but it’s actually on the mirror-universe world of Urth. And that puts us back at… well, what do we tell? How do we keep the book enjoyable while also getting people to buy it?

It’s a mess. Seriously. And everyone’s clawing their way through trying to find a balance that preserves the art but still serves the business. Everyone knows you can’t pick one over the other, but every single book (or movie or television show) becomes a new attempt at finding that balance point. The guidelines we use for my book won’t work for yours.

And it doesn’t help when some folks, deliberately or not, muddle things even more. We’ll play up the mention of that character or the appearance of that plot thread. I’ve seen things described as romances because of one thin subplot, or spiritual because someone prays at some point (I won’t tell you what they were praying for…) I’ve mentioned before how for a while any book or movie with a somehow-superhuman character was billed as a superhero story. These are the things that make people grumble about marketing, and make marketing folks grumble about people who just follow buzzwords.

Anyway…

I just thought it was worth tossing this out. Mostly because a few folks have complained long and hard about the marketing for Dead Moon. I’ve tried to address some of these things for, oh, eight or nine months nowbut… well, as I’ve been saying, some complaints are inevitable, no matter what.

But also partly because, like I said in the beginning, this is stuff worth knowing and thinking about.

And I’m sure there will be some more thoughts down in the comments.

Next time—like, tomorrow—some thoughts on dialogue.

Until then, go write.

Dead Moon Maberry marketing Matheson publishing Star Trek Star Wars

March 7, 2019 / 4 Comments

The Outline Experience

Hey everybody!

(Hi, Doctor Nick!)

I’d like to thank you all for your patience while I was off finishing that book. I went through a brutal last week of work on it. I decided to change the last five chapters and then still squeeze in another polish draft. Because why not, right…?

And I’m assuming you’ve all been patient. For all I know this was the last straw and you all said screw it—Victoria Schwab just tosses out great writing advice on Twitter. Why am I wasting time waiting for this guy to come back?

I may just be writing into the internet void.

Ah, well. I’ll give it a few weeks to be sure.

So, speaking of the void, a couple months back I talked about outlines, and how my attitude toward them has changed over the years. And it is so weird to say “over the years.” I’m still amazed I’ve been doing this for as long as I have.

Anyway, I talked a bit about outlines and promised to revisit the topic because… well, this book I just finished was the first time I’ve done a book with a really full, complete outline. The analogy I made was going from roughly planning out a trip to having an hour-by-hour itinerary. And since my previous attempts to work with an outline hadn’t gone so well, I thought it would be worth talking about what I did and how it all worked out in the end.

First off, as I mentioned before, the outline for this book was huge. Forty-two single-spaced pages, almost double what I’ve ever done before with this kind of blueprint. I had everything broken down by chapters, I had notes of which chapters were done from which points of view. And I had another four page document that was just notes on characters—names, backgrounds, wardrobe. I could probably say I had fifty pages of this done before I sat down to start actually writing it.

Remember that last bit—we’ll come back to it.

It’s also worth mentioning that I spent almost five weeks working on this outline. More than a month. There were many false starts. There was feedback. I pretty much went through drafts of my outline.

Was it worth it?

Well, taking the holidays and a week with a bad back into consideration, I finished up a first draft in just under nine weeks. That’s pretty good for me. My first drafts are usually somewhere between two to three months, so this one basically scraped right up against that, on the quicker side.

But…

It’s also worth noting that this was a much, much tighter first draft than I usually do. I’ve joked about the number of notes I’d usually leave for myself in a first draft. MAKE THIS SOUND COOLER or ADD A CHAPTER EXPLAINING THIS. Usually, I’d have ten or twelve of these in a first draft. This time around I had… four? Maybe five? And only two of them all that big. So my second draft took just over a week, if memory serves. About eight days, altogether. In the past, that’s been a three to four week process, patching over all those holes.

Now… let’s crunch some numbers.

I’m sure one or two of you are seeing this as a brilliant validation of outlines. They make things go so much faster and easier. Three months down to two? Three weeks down to a little more than one? Fantastic! I shaved 33% or more off my time.

Did I though…?

I mean, as I mentioned above, once I add in the five weeks of work for that outline, the overall work period is just about as long as it used to be. It went much smoother, yes—much less head-banging-on-keyboard—but I’m almost tempted to say it took a little bit longer. Not drastically longer, but I’m not sure it really saved any significant time in the long run. I just used the time differently.

Also worth mentioning—what’s that old chestnut, no plan survives contact with the enemy? Same thing here. No outline survives contact with the actual story. As things are building and fleshing out, they change. These are no longer those characters, able to carry out those actions. One character in this book had a complete 180 personality change from first to second draft, from angry yelling guy to eerily calm smiling guy. Which worked so much better for the story and made one of those fill-in-the-blank sections turn out completely different than I originally planned.

That’s also why the ending changed, as I mentioned at the start. I rewrote the last five chapters of the book. The last seven, really, because once the characters were well-established and the pace was set… well, I came to some realizations. One was that some of my ending was pointless conflict—just drama and action for the sake of drama and action, nothing else. Also, I had a much clearer view of how some characters would react, and those little tweaks changed how some things needed to happen.

One other thing to keep in mind that I’d never considered—using a really dense, detailed outline can be a bit brutal if you’re someone who likes tracking their word count. Every day I’d type out 1500-2000 words and feel really good about myself. And then I’d delete all the notes for that chapter, which would knock the overall word count back by 500-750 words. Yeah, I still wrote the same amount, but… well, if those numbers mean a lot to you, it can be kinda disheartening.

What does all this boil down to?

Well, not much. As I’ve said in the past, an outline is a tool for my writing arsenal, but there’s no law that says I have to use that tool. For me—someone writing on a hard deadline as part of my full-time job—yeah, I think I may try using this tool again. For you, maybe not. Maybe you’re still at a point where you can take the time to just feel your way through the story. Maybe you just don’t want to deal with an outline and have that much planned out for you. These are all fine things. Like so many things on the writing side, it comes down to what works best for you. That’s the Golden Rule I mention here so often.

And those are my thoughts on outlines.

At this point I’ll toss out the reminder that my latest book, Dead Moon, is currently available exclusively from Audible.com. It’s set in the Threshold universe, so if that’s your thing you may like it. You may like it anyway. Please check it out, and if you already did reviews are always appreciated.

Also, if you’re in the southern California area, this Sunday is the Writers Coffeehouse at Dark Delicacies in Burbank. We’ll be there noonto three chatting about exposition and types of contracts. As always, it’s 100% completely free (no fees, no dues, no sign-ups, no emails, nothing), and much like this blog, it’s kinda entertaining and semi-educational. Feel free to stop by.

Next time…

Well, it’s been a while. If anyone’s had a topic gnawing at them, please let me know in the comments. Otherwise I’ll just babble on about spelling or superheroes or something.

Until then… go write.

Coffeehouse Dead Moon drafts editing golden rule outline

January 29, 2019 / 10 Comments

Those Frequently Asked Questions

It’s been another six months and a few things have happened, so I thought it’d be worth updating this…

One aspect of being on social media a lot is getting asked questions. Which is overall fun and cool. But some times I get asked the same questions. Again and again. I suppose you could say they’re… frequently asked. This is less fun and cool.

The ugly truth is it can really wear on you to answer the same questions again and again because some folks won’t scroll down two or three posts or up through the comments. Between this blog, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook… well, it adds up to a lot of people repeating the same questions. Again and again.

(No, I’m not singling you out because you just asked a question. You just did it once without thinking. You’re cool, no worries.

(I’m talking about that other guy. Him. You know who I mean…)

Anyway… rather than get testy and frustrated with someone for asking the same question I already answered three times this morning in the same thread, I figured I’d scribble up answers to the most common questions I get and pin them on a lot of my social media pages.

Then when people ask me anyway, I can point them at this.

Or maybe I won’t say anything, cause… look, there’s an FAQ pinned right here.

1) What’s out next?

Well on Valentine’s Day you’ll (hopefully) be listening to Dead Moon, a sort of sci-fi horror story about zombies on the Moon and stuff like that. No, seriously. It’s kinda fun and pulpy and creepy. That’s exclusively with Audible for six months, sooo… we’ll probably talk more about that when I update this FAQ in July or August.

And speaking of July, late this summer, if everything times out, you should see another Audible exclusive from me– another beautiful Threshold book. It’s got a few threads, one of which involves a lonely guy named Murdoch who’s trying to deal with his childhood sweetheart, Anne, coming back into his life, and also her family… which is technically his Family, too. Also a guy named Chase who’s, ironically, on the run from something. And there’s some other characters in it you may recognize, too.

No, I don’t have a title for it yet. You’ll know when I do. But later this summer—maybe early fall—you should see that.

And if all times out well, I’m already roughing out a new standalone book that you (hopefully) will see… maybe this time next year? It’s still far out, so it’s hard to say.

2) Is Ex-Isle the last Ex book?

            Not 100% sure, but… yeah, looks that way.
            The truth is, every series has a limited life. Very few people decide to start on book three of a series—they go back and start at book one. So book one always sells the best for almost every series. Attrition says not as many people show up for book two, even less show up for book three, etc, etc. It’s always a downward slope heading for that red line where things aren’t profitable. None of the Ex-Heroes books have ever lost money (thank you all for that), but all the numbers say book six… Well, things don’t look great for book six where that red line’s concerned.
            The nails aren’t all in the coffin (do they still nail coffins shut?). Any number of things could make the series surge in popularity and get the publisher interested in putting out another book or two. Depending on how things work out, I might even be able to apply a little leverage. But for now… Ex-Tension is going to stay on that back burner. Sorry.

3) What if we did a Kickstarter or a GoFund me to continue the series?

Okay, look, I love the Ex-Heroes books. Hopefully you all know that. Those characters and stories got me where I am today. I love that there are so many fans who feel passionately about it. I had tons of fun writing them.
But…

The simple truth is, if there were enough people willing to pay for another book, the publisher would still be willing to put it out. Sure, some folks might pay twice as much to get one more book, but experience tells me three or four times as many people wouldn’t pay anything (for one reason or another). There’s pretty much no way this works out.

Plus, my schedule’s set up months in advance. As I hinted at above, I already know what projects I’m working on into 2020. Doing something like this means I haveto plan on said Kickstarter succeeding and put it into my schedule, which then means a gaping hole in my schedule when it doesn’t.

Again, sorry.

4) Will there be another book set in the Threshold series?

… I just answered this in question #1.

This is what I’m taking about! You’re not even really reading this, are you? You’re just skimming. Come on! I wrote all these out. You could at least put a little effort into this.

Jeeeeesh…

5) What’s all this ‘Threshold’ stuff, anyway?

Thresholdis the overall, umbrella name for the shared universe I kinda-sorta inadvertently kicked off seven years ago with 14. There are some books that are definitely part of an overall linear story, a “series” if you will, and some that just fall under the umbrella. Every Marvel movie is part of the MCU, but not every Marvel movie is a direct sequel to The Avengers. Or if you prefer, lots of Stephen King books tie into the Dark Tower mythology, but they’re not all part of the Dark Tower series. Does that make sense?

This makes things a bit awkward for me, because marketing folks love series (book one, book two, etc–heck, I’ve seen places where Rogue One is marketed as Star Wars Book #18) and some of them are reeeeeaally pushing Threshold as a pure, straightforward series, even though I’ve said again and again it isn’t. This may give some folks false expectations of what some books are going to be about, and I apologize if that’s you. I don’t want to lie to you, but I also don’t want to have to explain every book in advance (see #10). So I’m just trying to make things extra-good and fun so you won’t be too bothered that maybe you went in expecting Avengers: Endgame, and you ended up getting Ant Man and the Wasp.

Again, if that makes sense.

As a name, Thresholdfits in a few different ways. It’s part of a doorway, and doorways figure big into most of this series. It also refers to reaching a certain critical level—another recurring issue in these stories. And, finally, it’s also a reference to an old H.P. Lovecraft short story.

Which has nothing to do with anything, but I thought it was kinda cool…

6) So how does Dead Moon fit into this?

As it happens, I wrote a whole book explaining this.

(see #1, above)

7) Why do you keep saying “Audible exclusive” ?

There’s a very solid argument to be made that the majority of my fanbase is audiobook listeners. Odd, I know, but there it is. Audible knows this, too, and because of this they made me an extremely generous offer for exclusiverights to those two Threshold books (Dead Moon and that other one I mentioned up above). Both of these are going to be audiobook only for the first six months they’re out. After that, we’re talking to some folks, and (as I said above) I should have some answers for you by the time I update this FAQ.

And, yeah, I know this is going to make some of you grind your teeth. I’m very sorry if you’re die-hard against audiobooks and this leaves you out of the loop for a bit. My agent and I talked about it a lot, believe me (even with that generous offer). Every other day on the phone for about six weeks.

In the end, I really wanted to tell these stories and—for a couple different reasons—this was the best way to do it. Again, I’m sorry if this puts you in a bad spot.

8) Will there be a sequel to The Junkie Quatrain?

Very doubtful. I think a lot of the fun of The Junkie Quatrain was the overlapping- interconnected nature of the stories. It’d be tough to replicate that without feeling kinda forced and awkward. I think we’ll probably have to draw our own conclusions about what eventually happened to those characters. Well, the surviving characters.
Although, one of them may have already shown up somewhere else…

9) Do you make more money if I buy one of your books in a certain format?

This sounds like an easy question, I know, but there’s about a dozen conditionals to any answer I give. Figure a huge chunk of each contract is just all the different terms and conditions for when and if and how people get paid.

For example… format matters, sure, but so does where you bought the book. And when. And how many people bought it before you. And if it was on sale. And who was actually holding the sale. And all of this changes in every contract. What’s true for, say, The Fold may not be true for Paradox Bound.

TL;DR—just buy the format you like.

10) Why don’t you like people talking about your books?

To be honest, I’m still thrilled people talk about anything I wrote. Seriously. What I can’t stand are spoilers.

I’m thrilled Yakko enjoyed it so much when the protagonist found that and discovered this and learned about them. When he tells people about it, though—no matter what his intentions—Yakko’s ensuring that other folks won’t have as much fun with the book as he did. It’s like if I tell you how a magician does all her tricks and then take you to see her performance. You’re not supposed to see a magic show being aware of the resolutions in advance and knowing how all the tricks work. It kills most of the fun, because you’ve destroyed the structure that created a sense of wonder and discovery.

That’s why I avoid those questions in interviews, and why I always delete posts that reveal information from the back half of a book (yep, that’s probably what happened to your post). It doesn’t matter if the rest of the post was positive or negative—spoilers get deleted.

And not just my stories! You shouldn’t mess up other stories, either. Movies, TV—if you enjoyed it, try to give other people a chance to enjoy it the same way.

If you suffer from the heartbreak of spoilers Tourettes and absolutely must discuss your fan theories about my books, there are a couple secret groups on Facebook. There’s one for the Threshold books here, and one for the Ex-Heroes series here.

11) Do you have any plans to attend ******Con?

Right now…probably not

To be honest, last year was such a mad jumble with working on books and going to cons and moving that… well, I didn’t make a hell of a lot of plans for this year.

At the moment, the only thing on my schedule is WonderCon at the end of March. Absolutely nothing else. Not even sure I’m going to wander down to SDCC this year, to be honest.

But—things change all the time. If you want to see me at your local con, you need to let them know! Yeah, them, not me. I’m willing to go almost anywhere I’m invited, but if I’m not invited… well, there’s not much I can do. So, email them, tweet them, post on their Instagram account. Reach out and let your voice be heard.

And keep in mind that most cons finalize their guest list five or six months in advance, so if your local con’s in three weeks… odds are not in your favor. Sorry.

12) When are you going to make a movie/ TV series/ cartoon/ graphic novel/video game of your books?

            Okay, there’s a misunderstanding of how Hollywoodworks in this sort of question. When you see a film adaptation or TV series, it means the studio went to the writer, not the other way around. I mean, if it was just about the writer saying “hey, make this into a movie,” wouldn’t most books be adapted by now? Everyone would be doing it.
            Alas, I have zero say in whether or not Netflix wants to do an Ex-Heroes series or SyFy does aLycanthrope Robinson Crusoe movie. They’re looking for things that have piqued a certain level of interest, and so far these stories of mine have only just scraped that threshold.
            No, me (or you) writing the screenplay won’t make a difference, unless your name happens to be Shane Black, James Gunn, or David Koepp—and even then it’s not a sure thing. Because in case you forgot…

13) Wasn’t there going to be a TV series based on 14?
Yeah, in theory. A few years ago I was approached by Team Downey, the personal production company of that guy from Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Turned out he’s a fan of 14and he wanted to do something with it. So a deal was struck with his company and Warner Brothers TV.
But… there are no sure things in Hollywood. It’s all a big game of if. If a pilot gets greenlit, if it gets shot, if it turns out okay, if the assorted executives like it, if it gets picked up… Plus, some of these ifs are on a time limit. WB paid to extend that time limit once (which got a bunch of us very hopeful), but… in the end, it just didn’t happen.

Which all kinda goes with what I said up above in #11. Robert Downey, Jr. had signed on as an executive producer and that wasn’t enough to get the show made.
I still get to say he liked one of my books, though.

14) So, is there anything we can do to help?
Well, buying books is always a good step. Hollywoodlikes to see big sales numbers and interest. If you want to see something—anything—on the air, talk about it a lot on social media. Write reviews on websites. Producers/ directors/ actors all hear about this stuff the same way you do. If #ParadoxBound or #DeadMoon started trending on Twitter tomorrow, there’d probably be a film deal within a week.
(true fact—an easy way to help do this? Don’t buy books from Amazon. Write reviews there, sure, absolutely, but Amazon doesn’t report sales figures, so they don’t get included in things like the NYT Bestsellers list. Yeah, I know, a purchase from your local bookstore might cost a buck or three more, but it’s a purchase Hollywood is more likely to notice)

(Plus, then you’re one of those cool people who supports local businesses…)
(Yeah, Amazon owns Audible, but Audible reports audiobook sales. I don’t know why. Nobody does. It’s a mystery of the universe…)

15) Will you read my story and tell me what you think?

Short answer… no.

Part of this is a time issue—if I say yes to some folks, in the spirit of fairness I have to say yes to everyone. Now I’m spending all my time doing critiques instead of writing. Not to sound too mercenary, but… writing is how I earn my living. So when someone asks me to read stuff, they’re asking me to give up a few hours of work.

Plus, I do have this ranty blog sitting right here, y’know, with over a decade of writing advice and tips.

It’s also a legal thing. Some folks are lawsuit-crazy, often for no reason,, and the bad ones ruin it for everyone else. Let’s say Phoebe gives me a piece of fanfic to read where she has Harry and Eli showing up at a certain post-apocalyptic film studio. And then, a few years from now, I decide to do a big crossover story.

That’s when Phoebe sues me for stealing her material.

Yeah, it sounds stupid, but I’ve seen this happen so many times. Seriously. Hell, I’ve actually been subpoenaed and deposed over a case with less behind it than that example I just made up.

This is why I’m verrrry leery when I get a long message along the lines of “Hey, you know what should happen next with the Ex-Heroes series…” It’s why some writers have responded with cease & desist orders when they get sent stuff like this. It’s also why I’m not part of those above-mentioned spoiler groups.

So, the long answer is also… no. And if you send stuff without asking, I’ll delete it unread, just like spam mail. Sorry.

16) Will you at least be my friend on GoodReads?

Nope. Nothing against you (well… most of you), I just don’t like Goodreads. I’d explain why, but I’m taking the Thumper approach.

I post nothing there and spend as little time there as possible (which usually works out to “no time”). If you see anything there from “me,” it’s something someone else posted. I understand a lot of folks love the site and if it works for you, that’s fantastic. Glad you like it.

I won’t be there.

17) What’s up with your Facebook page?

Man. Facebook. What a mess, huh?

I started that Facebook fan page ten years ago, dreaming of a day when maybe—maybe—I’d have five hundred followers. Now it’s closing in on twenty times that and I have kinda regular thoughts about deleting the page.

Simple truth is, Facebook’s made it almost pointless to have a fan page. They’ve tweaked their algorithms so my posts have gone from being seen by 70-85% of fans to barely scraping 20% most of the time, all with the goal of having me pay to reach the people who’ve already said they want to see my posts. They’ve overcomplicated pages so it takes more time to do the same things I’ve always done. Hell, they’ve actually made it faster and easier to schedule posts than it is to live-post and directly interact with people.

And sure–it’s their site. They have the right to do what they want with it and run it the way they like. And of course they absolutely deserve to make money off it. I’m a progressive, but I still believe in (regulated) capitalism.

Maybe I’m old fashioned, but when someone talks casually about buying and selling people… it makes me uncomfortable.
So I’ve scaled way, way back on Facebook. Personally and professionally. I have no plans to change this in the near future.

18) What about Twitter or Instagram?

I’m @PeterClines on Twitter. Fair warning–as some of you may have figured out, I’m progressive and I’m a bit more political there. On Saturdays I also drink a lot and live-tweet bad movies so… hey, you know what you’re getting into. I’ll also say right up front I don’t believe in Twitter high school, where I’m supposed to follow someone just because they followed me. So if that’s your approach, I’ll save you time now…

Yeah, I know Instagram’s also owned by Facebook, but (for the moment) they’re not being quite so reprehensible over there. So (also for the moment) I’ll still be there.

And that should answer about 90% of your questions, yes…?

14 Dead Moon Ex-Heroes FAQ Threshold tips

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