Hugh Howey's Blog

Well, I didn’t look like an asshole last night. At least, not for the reason I feared. I would guess we had 20 or so readers show up at Lillie’s Victorian. It could have been more, because the hostess screwed up the reservations and had us at the front of the bar instead of back by the fireplace. But no matter, we had a blast.

I want to thank everyone for showing up and for being so damned awesome. The best part of the night, for me, was looking up and seeing former strangers talking about everything not-Wool. The group just gelled.

It also turned into something of an all-star author meet-up. Matthew Mather (author of the fantastic ATOPIA series) made an appearance, as did Dave Cullen, who wrote one of my favorite books, COLUMBINE. Kristin Nelson, my dynamite agent, stayed for a while. And Tim O’Connell, one of the rising stars at Knopf/Random House, stayed until after midnight.

I look forward to everyone sharing the pics they took, hearing what they thought of the evening, and seeing how fast all the spoilers I doled out permeate the interwebs. Yeah, the meet-up crowd knows more about the Wooliverse than anyone other than me. I believe a napkin full of schematics was smuggled out of the joint at some point…

It was a magical night for me. It must’ve been: I never stay up past midnight. So thank you to everyone who made it and to everyone who really wanted to be there but couldn’t. One of the highlights of my journey thus far, without doubt.

Come hang out with me this Wednesday, the 30th, at Lillie’s Victorian Bar and Restaurant. It’s right at Union Square, which is great for most trains. I’m planning on hanging out from 8:00 until 10:30 or so. The last time we did this, there were eight or so of us, and the time just flew by. It was a blast. I expect this meet-up to be no different.

Oh, and we’ve got the primo table reserved. A big square sucker back in front of the fireplace. So I need at least 11 of you to show up, otherwise I’ll look like an asshole.

Don’t let me look like an asshole.

This is something I never thought I’d see: One of my books on a national bestseller list. I’m #98 in USA Today among all books.

I remember the first time I popped onto any list of any sort. It was the Science Fiction > Anthologies list on Amazon with the very first Wool book. I think it happened back in October or November of last year. It began my obsession with screen-capping my books on lists, always assuming they were about to drop right back off.

Still operating under that assumption, so here goes:

The last morning in the sun porch. The last evening at the dog park. The last time I’ll eat at our favorite Mexican joint. It feels like the last everything.

Our house is a huge pile of boxes. I can’t figure out where all this stuff was hidden, or where it’ll go once we get down there.

I leave tomorrow and won’t be back until next Sunday. Monday will be our day of stuffing the truck. Tuesday, we hit the road.

For those of you with orders in for signed books, I’m really going the extra mile. I’ve got some signed and packaged that my wife will ship off on Tuesday (the post office is closed tomorrow). I’m also having her bring the books set to arrive here at the house this week when she comes to ConCarolinas. I’ll have padded mailers and printed address labels down there with me, so we’ll get the rest off on Friday before we hit the convention. The next time I ship off signed books, it’ll be from Florida, from a different post office. Because the last time I went to the post office up here was one more case of my last . . . everything.

The new site design is going live, and it’s a piecemeal process. Bear with me.

Also: That banner is not staying like that. I’ve got a nice one I’m working to get back in place. All kinds of fun stuff breaking, but some cool things already in place.

The About Me, Books, and Reviews pages are all new. And the Forums link goes to the new vBulletin forum, which is sparse right now, but I’ll be working on that as well.

Amber and I are just about a week away from moving into a new home. I think that’s a good excuse to spruce things up around here as well. There’s a new-look website coming. Even better, I’m taking that coffee money you’ve been providing, and getting you all something special: a new forum. I bought a license to vBulletin, probably the most popular forum software in the galaxy. Very clean and easy to get around (you’ve been on them before, whether you knew it or not).

Hopefully it’ll make discussing all sorts of topics easier. And the new website is so clean and purty; I can’t wait to let you all track mud through it.

This takes book promoting to new heights (har). If you’re not grinning at the halfway point, you’re probably an alien. Who hates people who litter space.

Watch the entire thing. And then go grab the book. It’s outside in your tree.

No, I’m not dancing in Times Square again. I can’t do that without my little sis along to give me company, strength, and an increased sense of timing.

This second take is all about meeting up with you all! In just a few days, I’ll be touching down in the Big Apple. I’d love to sit and sip a cold one and chat about what the hell ever. Last time, we had 8 or so readers show up, and it was a blast. We talked about what they did for a living, kids, favorite books, the city, all kinds of stuff. I think we chilled for almost two hours. Still, it seemed to fly by.

This time, we’ll be hanging out at Lillie’s Victorian Bar and Restaurant. Come join us on Wednesday the 30th. I’m going to try and be there by 8:00, and I’ll probably hang out until 10:30 or so. Lillie’s is right near Union Square, on 17th between 5th and Broadway. I’m going to beg superstar author Jonathan Hayes to join me, but he’ll likely decline. Such outings are beneath men of his stature.

Best thing I’ve ever seen, and seeing it at precisely the right time.

I’m now committed to enjoying this more. And to making good art.

I love my readers. Really, I do. Even the ones with eye patches.

I’ve been known to download a thing or two without paying for it. I’ve got songs I’ve snagged because I bought the cassette two decades ago and feel entitled to own the material for life. I’ve “sampled” games and software before paying for them. I was a general scallywag when I was younger.

As I got older and started earning a paycheck . . . no, that’s not what happened. I could always afford these things. What happened is that I got lazy. The pain in the ass of finding a keygen and dealing with the viruses that came with pirated games or software, at some point the thrill of getting something for free wore off and I just wanted to spend the money, own the thing legally, be able to install updates and all that, and above all: support the people who code and create art and are trying to afford daycare for their kids.

When I became a content creator a few years ago, I used my own experiences as a guide. I wanted it to be easy as hell for other people to own my stuff. That meant never putting DRM on my e-books. This is the digital rights management protection that makes it difficult to convert my books, copy them around, all that stuff. I wanted to reward the buyer rather than worry about the pirate.

Some of my favorite game developers adopted this strategy a while back. No DRM at all, because they knew fans would reward them for making it easy to install and own the game. I always bought those games on the day of release. It was the model I wanted to emulate.

The funny thing is, it took the Wool explosion to even land me on pirate sites. I felt no small twinge of pride when I first saw that I was getting passed around by pirates. It’s a mark of desirability. And here’s the cool thing, tonight I got an e-mail from someone who stole the Omnibus, loved it, and sent me more than the retail price through Paypal. And they wanted to let me know that they couldn’t find FIRST SHIFT: LEGACY on any of the pirate sites. So I fired up Calibre, converted one of my .mobi Kindle files to .epub, and sent the pirate a copy.

How cool an exchange is that? There’s a ton of little software programs that I use daily, like VSO Resize and WinRar that I love to support. There’s probably a dozen or so apps like this that I’ve paid for after years of using them for free. Some have trial versions that allow the free use, but once I saw how much I relied on the thing, I wanted to support the creator.

Look, I’m just delighted to have readers. Especially readers as awesome as you all. People who counsel me when I’m down, who buy me a cup of joe because they think my prices are unreasonably low, who chime in on negative reviews to let trolls know that you aren’t imaginary, who order signed copies of books they’ve already read, who make this website an active, exciting place to visit, and who pay for the books they steal . . . because they liked them that much.

Arrgh, everyone. Arrrgh. I think that says it all.