Second Olympus

Yesterday, as I was working on my copy editing phase for Second Olympus, I Googled something involving the use of the possessive apostrophe on names ending in S. (I know, wild and crazy stuff, right?) The amusing thing was, the first hit that popped up was a thread on a writers’ forum from 2008. It was my thread, asking the same exact question for the same exact reason on the same exact book.

First off, let’s not talk about my powers of retention. Second, it made me realize that by the time Second Olympus actually releases, it will be 7 years old, and it will have a long road behind it already.

I started writing Second Olympus (then called Muse) back in 2008 after I’d finished the first JJD book (then called Third Strike, since we’re talking trivia). I was querying, trying to find an agent, and I knew I had to keep writing to get my mind off of it. A stray conversation late one night with a friend lead to the idea of Muse, and I got to work.

It was unlike anything I’d been writing, up to that point. I had a trunked epic fantasy under my belt, and JJD1 which was urban fantasy. Muse was…different, which was scary and exhilarating all at once. I stretched myself beyond my own literary box, and in the end, I was really proud of what I’d done. I think I finished it sometime in early 2009, about the same time we sold the JJD series.

Of course, from that point, I got busy with JJD stuff and new projects. Every so often, I’d go back to Muse and revise bits and pieces, send it to new readers, get their thoughts, add my own. My first agent wasn’t super gung-ho about it, I could tell, not because it was badly written, but because he just didn’t see a traditional market for it. And that’s their job, to know those things.

Time went on, years went by. I wound up with a new agent. When she asked about other projects I had, I of course sent her Muse, ‘cause I was still super proud of it. She had the same feelings about it, that traditional publishing probably wasn’t going to be interested. That was the point where I’d just had success getting JJD4 out on my own, and I knew that I could do this. So, with her permission, I moved forward with self-publishing Muse. That actual decision was made…probably July-ish, 2014? (Yes, looking at the date in the picture below, that was exactly when I made that decision)

I did another round of new beta readers, and their suggestions really made the book into what it is at this moment. I came up with a new title, and hopefully on March 24th, 2015, you will all get to read Second Olympus. (See what I did there? Slipped a release date right in like that. Ain’t I sneaky?)

I can’t even count how many rounds of revisions this thing went through. I probably have four different printed copies of this thing floating around my house, and at one point, I just quit printing it out and started making my editing notes on the same draft, just in different colors so I could tell the evolutions apart.

(This picture is the pile of previous drafts of everything. Muse, JJD1-JJD4, Peacemaker, MBG. I have no idea what to do with these. Do I throw them away?)

I should finish the copy edits this week on my lunch breaks, and then this weekend, I’ll get the print copy formatting done. Once I have a firm page count, I can commission the cover art and get this ball truly rolling.

My goal for release is March 24th, like I said above, contingent on cover art and zombie apocalypse, of course. I’ll try to get everything up for pre-order by March 1st if I can (the print copy won’t have a pre-order phase, but I’ll make it available a few days early, like I did with JJD4, so we can all read on the release date). I’ll also try to have limited print copies available for reviewers who want them, so folk definitely need to let me know. (kari.stewart21 (at) gmail.com)

I keep going through these deep highs and lows with this thing. The highs are where I’m SO FREAKIN’ EXCITED to have this book out and available. After all this time, it’s still one of my favorite stories. The lows are where I’m damn certain this is garbage, and that fans of my JJD books aren’t going to like something that’s so very different from what they’re used to from me.

I guess time will tell.

Another Year

If possible, I’m actually getting worse about maintaining this blog.

SO, where am I, and what am I doing?

First off, Snake has done very well since its release. (at least, in my mind) Well enough that I am wholly encouraged about self-publishing more things in the future, not just the JJD books. I fully admit, though, every time I see a sale pop up in my report, I do a little happy dance. That’s never going to get old.

 My intention is to have Muse available in the coming spring (though I’m pondering a title change, I’ll keep you posted). It’s a story I dearly love that I just don’t think is ever going to find a traditional home. I’ll have some fun stuff to go along with it when I get close to releasing it, as it’s one of the few books I have that actually has a soundtrack.

And JJD5 I’m still pondering for fall next year, but considering that I haven’t actually started writing it yet, that’s a moving target. On the upside, I’ve finalized titles for the last two JJD books, so that’s one less thing on my brain. No, I’m not going to tell you yet, because final is only truly final when it’s on the cover.

 “But, what about Ernst?” you cry. “Don’t you love Ernst anymore???” Of course I love Ernst. How can you not love Ernst? But right now, I feel like I need to finish at least ONE series before I worry about the next one. Especially when I still feel like I need to alternate writing for myself (self-published) and writing to try to sell traditionally. On that note, once I get JJD done, and AW (which is only intended to be a trilogy), I’ll be seriously considering self-pubbing my Otherkind series as well. Only have the first book of that done, but there are more in my brain, and since urban fantasy seems to be flagging a little in the traditional market, self-pubbing may be the way to go with that one too.

At the very least, I’m hoping to have those two books out in 2015, then maybe try to get AW2 & JJD6 out in 2016 (gods, it’ll be weird to say goodbye to J & Co.), and then AW3, OK1 in 2017. This is all barring any other book sales I might make between now and then, and since the Lovely Agent is currently shopping something around, it’s entirely possible.

So if I’m not working on JJD5 or AW2 right now, what am I working on? Funny you should ask. If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you’ve seen me use the hashtag #MMwD. I don’t have an actual title for this bizarre thing I’m fiddling with, but in my brain, I’m calling it “Mad Max with Dragons”. You could also call it the bastard love child of “Reign of Fire” and “Book of Eli”. In short, I’m not sure what the hell I’m doing, but the words keep coming, so I’m just rolling with it. I’ve honestly lost the ability to even tell if this thing is any good. In fact, I’m about 90% sure it’s not any good. I’m about 40K words into it, which would be half a novel, but I have a feeling that this is going to be longer than my normal 80K goal.

And that’s my life in a (very large, rather disjointed) nutshell.

Feel free to ask any questions, or point and mock, or berate me on my treatment of magical jackalopes.

The Definitive List

All right, now that things have settled a bit, here is the definitive list of places where you can buy A Snake in the Grass.

Print Edition
Amazon
Createspace
Barnes & Noble

E-Book
Kindle
Nook
Kobo
iTunes
Smashwords

So...how's it going?  Not too bad.  I've already sold enough to recover my costs, so at the very least, I can seriously consider self-pubbing the next two in the series and not take a loss at it.  And truthfully, if I made even a $1 profit, I was going to continue on.  I need to finish it, for Jesse.

How can you help?  Buy the book, obviously, and tons of you are already doing that.  Tell your friends if you love the series. See if they might love it too.  And leave reviews at Amazon, at Barnes & Noble.  Even if the book wasn't your cuppa, leave a review and say that.  Reviews help drive a lot of the algorithms that make books pop up in the "Hey, if you liked that, you may like THIS" recommendations, which can get JJD in front of people who may never have heard of it before.  

And in the meantime, I will be trying to work on something else.  ANYthing else.  Ugh.  I have an old project, Muse, that I'm revisiting, with an eye to self-pubbing it too in the future.  My lovely agent has given me a wishlist of things she'd love to see, so I'm trying to bang out new ideas there.  And of course, I have JJD5 looming on the horizon.  It needs an outline at the very least.

My problem with all of these choices is that it's too much. How to I focus on one task when...ooh, shiny!  Hopefully, something will settle with me soon, and then I can get my butt in gear.

The Latest and Greatest

Once again, my lack of posting astounds even me.  In my defense, though, I've been working.  Like, actual writing working, not Real Job working (though I've been doing that too)

So, what's been going on?

Well, I took the entire month of June to do edits on Peacemaker, and turned those in two whole days early.  Go me!  And just this week, I got an email back from my wonderful editor saying that those revisions have been accepted, so Peacemaker's almost a finished product, and that's a bit of stress off my mind.  Granted, I've never had revisions NOT accepted, but a little part of me is always fearful that she's going to come back and say "this is the suckiest thing in the history of sucky things that suck, do it over".

Right now, I'm working on JJD4.  I'm about 11K words into it, which doesn't seem like very much, 'cause it isn't.  But I've been writing almost every day, even if it's just a little bit, and I'm really starting to sink back into the world again.  It's kinda comfy there, like a big pillow.  A big, fluffy, demon-infested pillow.

I'm still struggling with a title for it.  I thought I had one, months ago, but the more I think about it, the less I like it, so it's back to the drawing board.  Figure, if I'm self-publishing it, I can come up with a title whenever I feel like it, right?

Been learning a lot about self-publishing over these past few months, too.  It's starting to not feel as daunting as it once did.  Ideally, if I can stick to my own self-imposed timeline, I hope to have JJD4 up and functional by March.  All of this contingent on me actually finishing it, of course, and cover art & editing schedules.  My intention is to do ebook on pretty much all platforms, and maybe do a print edition through Amazon's Createspace.  It won't be the same size as the first three books, because they don't offer a mass-market paperback size, and I fully admit that this makes me a little crazy.  They're supposed to match, dammit! Ah well, we take what we can get.

My lovely agent has read The Musicbox Girl, and given me some really great revision notes on it.  She's completely right in everything she said, I just have to wrap my brain around how to fix it.  Right now, that's not going to happen, because I'm trying to work on JJD4, and quite frankly, the writing is different enough that trying to do both at once might scramble my last two brain cells.

I've also sent Muse to the lovely agent, mostly to see if it's something she'd be interested in trying to sell, or if I should just start pondering self-publishing that too.  Honestly, I read through parts of it again, and the whole thing still gives me chills.  It's still one of the best things I've ever written (in my admittedly warped mind) and I'd like to see it available someday.

And, in case you missed it, Peacemaker is up for pre-order on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.  It's also up on Goodreads, if anyone wants to add it to their to-read list. No cover art yet, of course, but I'm hoping soon.  Do you realize that we're actually less than 6 months away from release on that one already??  Time flies when you're having fun.

Remember, Peacemaker will be ebook only at first.  If sales are good enough, they may release it in print later.  I've had several people lament that they don't have a Kindle or a Nook or whatever, but remember if you have a smart phone or a computer, the Kindle app is a free download, and you can read my book right on your phone!

So, current timelines are looking like this:
Autumn 2013 - copy edits on Peacemaker (actual deadline unknown)
November 1 - finish JJD4
Nov/Dec - editing & cover art for JJD4, and revising MBG
January 21, 2014 - Peacemaker release!
Jan/Feb/Mar 2014 - drafting Arcane West #2?
March-ish 2014 - JJD4 release!
Summer 2014 - drafting JJD5?

After that, everything's a moving target.  Heck, half the stuff ON the list is still a moving target.  Ah well.  This is the good life, right?