Monday, January 2, 2017

Update: A Gestating Literary Litter

Hello again, readers!

Work on the official Empyrean Dreams books proceeds steadily, if not as quickly as we first hoped.  I hear such things are normal for any project, much less a book.  Considering that we're compiling multiple books, a longer estimate might have been wise.

Still, we're crossing off tasks.  The third Stchvk detective story, "Binding Threads", is complete in its first full draft.  It will appear alongside "Bad Egg" and "Broken Record" in the largest of our four planned books.  The Scape Grace stories fit nicely still into two volumes, one containing the first story, "Wreck of the Untranslatable" and a second containing "Escape from Grace" and the new story, "A Change of Plans".

Book number four will contain short stories from both of us, all set in the same Universe but filling in various smaller corners.  This book will include the newer, unpublished stories "Labyrinthine" and "An Apostate's Dilemma". 

What's yet to do?  A lot of editing and formatting, mostly.  We also need to choose a printer and adjust our layouts to their preferences.  Art would be nice, but a basic starfield will do if necessary.  Our current target is to have at least one book ready for sale before the end of January, ideally with a few physical copies delivered to local bookstores on consignment.  After that?  Advertising!

Note that we will happily take suggestions for a print-on-demand service, if anyone knows one they particularly like.  We'll also take suggestions for an artist, although our demands for such a person could be steep and our budget, though non-zero, is also not high. 

Maybe we'll save the fancy art and style for a second edition, once the first edition has pulled in some profit... and maybe a publisher's attention?

We can always Dream.

-NL