Sorry, all out of subject lines.
Feb. 12th, 2011 05:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexandraerinI've had a weird, random attack of anxiety and stress this past night. I don't know what caused it. I'm at a relative lull in the The Gift of the Bad Guy project, the previews have gone out with only minor issues that were easily fixed and the pre-sale's going very well considering that I haven't begun to push it yet.
Actually, I suppose that might be the cause... I've reached the point I was focused on and now all the nervous energy that was being channeled in that one direction lacks direction.
In any event, next week I'm going to be with my parents. It's going to be a regular work week for Tales of MU, but I'm going to be relaxing a bit on some of the other stuff that I've been working on... with only my netbook there there'd be a limit on how much non-writing stuff I could do. I think it'll be a timely break, as I've been pushing myself hard lately.
Among the things I'm going to be doing is sort of "auditing" my old and languishing projects to see what has the most potential for being "litsnacked". Revisiting old work is often pleasurable and even revelatory, so it's kind of a light job.
I'm not just going to be looking at what has a high page count that I can throw into an e-book and put up for money. I'm going to be looking at stories that had... that have potential but didn't reach them, and figuring out how I can either bring them to some kind of a conclusion or get them to a point that I can start building on them again.
I'm going to begin (or rather, resume) work on the sequel to The Gift of the Bad Guy as soon as it's completed, but I also have my eye on other projects that can be worked on at the same time. Some of the top contenders for the first non-gifters LitSnacks book are:
There are other things I have "on tap" that will require more development, and other projects that have a substantial word count available but that I'm not ready to adapt into this format. Still, some of them might see the light of day before all of the above have done so. Part of the point of this is that it's a format where I can develop a book very quickly when the muse moves me. I mentioned at one point (I think before I started working on The 3 Seas, when I made a post about different ideas I had that I wanted to do something with) a story about post-apocalyptic survival... it's been rearing its head in the back of mine for a while now.
I've never wanted to do anything with it because to me even a really interesting apocalypse isn't a story, it's a backdrop... a setting. And a story that's a bunch of people or a single person or a couple banding together for survival is really just a form of wish fulfillment, as counter-intuitive as that might sound. The typical apocalypse survival scenario is "real life, but then adventure happens, and only I/my surrogate and company have the skills to deal with the adventure", writ large. It's not terribly interesting to me. But writing the first chapter of The Gift of the Bad Guy gave me some insight into a protagonist and an angle on the story that speaks to me.
Anyway, in case anybody's wondering why I set up a webpage called "LitSnacks" for a one-person operation instead of just selling the books on my personal website I'm simultaneously building up: no, I'm not interested in running an actual e-press or publishing other people's works. But I'm operating under a theory that to people who aren't already Alexandra Erin fans, a "company" page will seem more like It's An Actual Thing, and people trust Actual Things more than they trust people on the internet. It could be the difference between hitting back/x as soon as the page loads or sticking around to see what it's about.
I'm not trying to set up my own little playground and cut it off from everybody else, though... that's pretty much the opposite of what I want to do with myself this year. Once I have some more of my own content on the site, I am going to see about starting an affiliate program where other people can put up links to their own inexpensive e-books.
Actually, I suppose that might be the cause... I've reached the point I was focused on and now all the nervous energy that was being channeled in that one direction lacks direction.
In any event, next week I'm going to be with my parents. It's going to be a regular work week for Tales of MU, but I'm going to be relaxing a bit on some of the other stuff that I've been working on... with only my netbook there there'd be a limit on how much non-writing stuff I could do. I think it'll be a timely break, as I've been pushing myself hard lately.
Among the things I'm going to be doing is sort of "auditing" my old and languishing projects to see what has the most potential for being "litsnacked". Revisiting old work is often pleasurable and even revelatory, so it's kind of a light job.
I'm not just going to be looking at what has a high page count that I can throw into an e-book and put up for money. I'm going to be looking at stories that had... that have potential but didn't reach them, and figuring out how I can either bring them to some kind of a conclusion or get them to a point that I can start building on them again.
I'm going to begin (or rather, resume) work on the sequel to The Gift of the Bad Guy as soon as it's completed, but I also have my eye on other projects that can be worked on at the same time. Some of the top contenders for the first non-gifters LitSnacks book are:
- The 3 Seas
- The NanNo that I started under the title "Dustball Ramblers"... needs expanding, but there's quite a bit there to work with.
- A book based on that Fantasy In Miniature story that everyone said would make a good book. You know. That one.
- The unfinished Marnie Masterson story The Stars My Devastation.
There are other things I have "on tap" that will require more development, and other projects that have a substantial word count available but that I'm not ready to adapt into this format. Still, some of them might see the light of day before all of the above have done so. Part of the point of this is that it's a format where I can develop a book very quickly when the muse moves me. I mentioned at one point (I think before I started working on The 3 Seas, when I made a post about different ideas I had that I wanted to do something with) a story about post-apocalyptic survival... it's been rearing its head in the back of mine for a while now.
I've never wanted to do anything with it because to me even a really interesting apocalypse isn't a story, it's a backdrop... a setting. And a story that's a bunch of people or a single person or a couple banding together for survival is really just a form of wish fulfillment, as counter-intuitive as that might sound. The typical apocalypse survival scenario is "real life, but then adventure happens, and only I/my surrogate and company have the skills to deal with the adventure", writ large. It's not terribly interesting to me. But writing the first chapter of The Gift of the Bad Guy gave me some insight into a protagonist and an angle on the story that speaks to me.
Anyway, in case anybody's wondering why I set up a webpage called "LitSnacks" for a one-person operation instead of just selling the books on my personal website I'm simultaneously building up: no, I'm not interested in running an actual e-press or publishing other people's works. But I'm operating under a theory that to people who aren't already Alexandra Erin fans, a "company" page will seem more like It's An Actual Thing, and people trust Actual Things more than they trust people on the internet. It could be the difference between hitting back/x as soon as the page loads or sticking around to see what it's about.
I'm not trying to set up my own little playground and cut it off from everybody else, though... that's pretty much the opposite of what I want to do with myself this year. Once I have some more of my own content on the site, I am going to see about starting an affiliate program where other people can put up links to their own inexpensive e-books.