So what have you been up to in the bajillion days since you last posted, Thumper? Threes of people really want to know.
Largely, this:
I finished the vomit draft of the next Wick book. It's super raw, way too much dialog and a whole lot of "he shrugged," "he snorted," and "he turned to X person." All placeholder crap for the actual first draft, which I'll start working on...checks watch...in about 15 minutes.
This may actually wind up being two novellas. It's told in two parts, the second much longer than the first, so there may be some tweaking and additions to make the first part stand on its own. My gut says it will be a better story if I do it that way, and it also says that once my editor has it in hand, she'll agree.
Chapter by chapter (I hope), as I get into this, I'll post what I've gotten done on (I hope) the website for this part of the Wick series. I'm still looking for ways to better protect the content, but I'm coming up dry, so it may just wind up in whole on its blog, and I'll take a bunch of chances with piracy.
Will it eventually make it into print? Sure. But this isn't about the money or the sales; never really has been, except for the efforts of sales to generate Max's annual toy drive. I may (still dunno, I am so on the fence about this) slap a tip jar on the site, with anything raised being used for the toys.
I considered using Patreon, but I keep hearing horror stories about creators locked out of their accounts, Patreon changing terms, and a whole bunch of other complaints. I support several people on P, but I haven't been able to make myself leap to the Creator thing. It still might happen, though, if I can offer free content with a pay-as-you-want option.
I've considered Medium, as well...but again, not sure about the terms, and to get any traction you pretty much have to bank on your readers being $5/month members. And it sounds like the payments are paltry. Again, not about the money, but I have issues with platforms making a lot off their content provides while giving little in return.
See, here I am, talking myself into posting everything at The Lost Boys of Everywhen blog...
Looking at it, there needs to be a design shakeup, too. It does not look super nice at this point, but I tossed the background on just to have one, and then used it to create the title image. Reminds me of the early web, when we though we were so cool to have figured out a modicum of HTML and everything was eye-popping, painful neon and spinning images.
I had a site on Prodigy, uploaded soon after they released their web browser...super early on. IIRC, it was a lot of dark blue and bright red, occasionally so seeped in contrast that it made my eyes hurt after looking at it for a few minutes.
I kind of miss those days, when the truly simple and gaudy was SUPER AWESOME COOL and a basic site could get you offers to create something for someone else. For real money, even. No Paypal or Venmo, just paper checks in the mail because for gawd knows why, we trusted each other enough for that.
In any case, sooner rather than later, there will be content on The Lost Boys of Everywhen...I'm ot working at my usual speed, thanks to a 2nd project I have in the works (bikes!) and to not having my writing partner, but it'll get done.
I just need to work on the whole cliffhanger thing to keep y'all coming back for more.
