Aleksandr Voinov's Blog: Letters from the Front, page 2

Burn This City - it's a big book

The official second draft of Burn This City is weighing in at 106,531 words. It's been pretty intense "self-edits" - really a misnomer because those were both my edits and I've also gathered feedback from the betas, and some of the feedback had a major impact on what is now the second draft. 

The first draft had about 101k words, and I know for a fact I've cut short scenes and multiple paragraphs to the tune of 7-8k, but ended up with a longer book, so I've probably written around 10-15k new words, and this is before the editors have even touched it. I'm expecting a cover concept in the next few days too. 

I'm still laughing when I think that this  was meant to be a "simple dark romance, no more than 50-60k because I don't really have much plot". You'd think I'd know how this will go by now. 

With the book sent of to the editors, I'll now focus on some translation work and research for my mainstream fantasy trilogy and the WWII book I've been meaning to write for far too many years, but those won't be 2021 news - just the WWII book alone will next probably 6-8 more months, and the trilogy could easily take longer than that. 

Mostly, it'll be good to clear the mafia research books and notes from my desk and think about/work on something different. This pass has been really intense because the first draft was in a very poor state (not going to work like that again), and keeping 106k in my head at the same times is really quite tough. 

But, in any case, it's done and I think it's shaping up to be a good book, and that is what counts. 

Burn this City update

The edits of Burn this City are taking pretty long (I wanted to be done last week, and then the heat wave just short-circuited my brain, so I'm likely going to need a few more days). But the link is up and I should hit the deadline. This one will be my first KU release. We don't have a cover yet, but I'll reveal it on this blog once Lady Tiferet has sent me the final version.

I've now called Burn this City my m/m swansong a few times and while that shocked me the first time, it's now something I'm increasingly accepting. I think I'm through all five stages of grief when it comes to m/m; I'm not quite at the place where I'm excited about the future, but I'm mostly done with the past at least. And it's not like I've wasted those past 15 years - I've met great (fictional and non-fictional) people, learnt some important life lessons, grown as an artist and had fun. That's worth a lot and I'll always remember that period fondly.

And once the mind relaxes, the Muse brings ideas. So a few days ago, I woke up with an idea.

I spent the morning on a Discord call with a very old, dear friend of mine, and I pitched him my historical fantasy series that's been taking shape. I already have four characters and set a few very broad parameters (technology level, type of magic/occultism, gender relations), and now I'll incubate - that is, gather ideas, plots, read some books, put together an outline, and so on.

Basically, I'll pour everything into the book that I love and have loved for decades. One big change will be that the principal character will be a (bisexual) woman, and love/romance will be a part of the plot, but I'd expect won't take more than 10-15% of the time on page. At this point, I've definitely left my old comfort zones behind.

I think one reason why I've clung to M/M for as long as I have - and may write the occasional book to complete arcs and series I've started, or if the idea is so compelling that it overrides everything else - is just the people. As I explained to my friend, pretty much everybody I know socially is somehow involved with the industry. Almost all of my social media feed comes from M/M and romance people, and the time and focus spent on observing the industry and looking at trends etc have taken a huge amount of my mental hard drive. And re-orientating myself towards my new genre will take time and I'll be the new kid in the school, even though I was around there 15-20 years ago.

I think fantasy in Germany has evolved past all those barriers I encountered there when I started out in fantasy/sci-fi. I went into M/M fifteen years ago because the type of book I wanted to write had no market/space in the genre I came from. It occurs to me I'm leaving it pretty much for the same reasons, so we're coming full circle, and as somebody who thinks in cycles, I like that idea very much.

I keep re-reading the previous blog entry, and I still attempt to poke holes into the logic and reasoning. I guess I just on some level don't love change. I'll feel more comfortable and more excited about the change once it's actually done - and done in the writing game means stories are actually being written. Once I'm halfway through plotting and/or writing the first book in the series (I just know this is a large multi-book project), I'll find my wings again. It's always that way.

I did have to reckon with the reasons why I write the things I do, and why they don't sell enough to make this successful (and financially viable) for me. I'm not going to break myself on the wheel of trying to inhabit the space I've created for myself and which is just not working for me anymore - if it were just about grinding for a few more years, I could do it, but all I see is ever-diminishing returns. A friend in the m/m space said it bluntly: "They've forgotten you." And he's right.

At the same time, historical and fantasy m/m doesn't sell, and I've felt constricted by the m/m part of it for so long (things you're allowed to do and things that people expect, such as a certain heat level and number and explicitness of sex scenes, but mostly how much of the book I need to spend on developing the romance), so going back to a bigger audience that is now much more ready for queer characters makes sense for me. I'm even thinking of "porting over" a couple of my backlist books by cutting back the romance and ramping up the fantasy elements, hey, presto, instant military fantasy trilogy. 

Market research indicates that mainstream fantasy is largely driven by trilogies and larger series, so my friend said, "The faster you can get yourself anchored in the market with two or better three trilogies, the better." So once I've made Burn this City the best I can, I'll get started on that.

I'll have to set up even a rudimentary website for the "new" author, though I don't think I'll do quite as much social media (I just don't have the capacity). In addition, the new books will be written in German and then translated into English. I'm aiming for a very specific voice which will be easier to write in German. 

The "acceptance" stage of grief comes with a huge amount of relief. Dragging all those negative emotions and fighting the inevitable sure was exhausting. 

I'm not yet at "happy and excited", but at least I have a large, complex series to sink my mental teeth into, and my German fantasy buddy is excited about the concept, so I'm off to a good start. In many ways, all I'm doing is coming home. 

Future plans (Burn this City and beyond)

I'm currently reviewing the beta feedback/edits I've received from my beta squad - thank you! - and I'm pretty sure that I can fix the big issues and all the small ones too, so I've possibly optimistically put the book up for pre-orders. Readers who enjoyed Dark Soul should get a kick out of this one. I'll devote the next six weeks to polishing up this book and making it what it can be.

Meanwhile, and after much back and forth with friends, publishers and peers, and after spending a lot of time reading about and research audience targeting, it's clear I'm missing the mark with my "gritty plotty m/m romance" niche that I've tried to inhabit for the past, oh, 12-13 years.

I've always written books that I'd like to read - writing is hard enough, not writing what I enjoy would make it too hard for me - but that audience is very small indeed. It's clear to me that I've tried to serve three disparate audiences and failed at satisfying even one of them enough that I could grow my sales in a way that's financially sustainable for me. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over.

I've always said that I can't afford to subsidise my writing from the day job. Writing was supposed to be my financial escape hatch, not another ball and chain that forces me to stay put where I am only so I can afford good quality editing, covers and marketing.

My failure, if one can call it that, is that I've failed to satisfy an audience that's large enough to help me build that financial escape hatch, and getting out of the day job is my life goal number 1. I've pondered  all kinds of solutions - mostly writing "to market", but the truth is, I already have two jobs that feel like work, and both are much better paid, and I don't have the energy to add a third job just for the money - because I sure as hell wouldn't enjoy it.

I've failed at ever gaining any traction in Kindle Unlimited, but it's clear to me that the vast majority of readers no longer pays outright for books (I get it, the pandemic has been tough) - I've heard so often "if it's not in KU, I'm not interested", I've watched my sales and royalties dwindle, and I've seen the past few books sink pretty much without a trace. How much of that is because Amazon makes my "wide" books invisible to my readers, and how much is me simply failing to deliver a reading experience that creates repeat non-KU readers, I'm not even going to speculate. Probably a bit of both.

Another thing that doesn't work for me is the incredible volume expected from "romance authors". With the day job, I'm glad if I can write one, maybe eventually two books a year. That's not enough in m/m romance to even get noticed, and the Amazon algos will sink any book after six weeks max. One used to be able to survive for three months on a new launch, but those days are now ancient history. I've tried every productivity trick and plan and method I could find - but the truth is, writing is emotional labour for me and I need to understand and wholly develop the characters and world and plot, and that's not possible for me in a week or two. The truth is: I'm too slow to "make it" in romance. Meanwhile, I'm also not going to publish half-cocked, unedited, rushed stuff as part of a "minimum viable product" strategy that's being touted in indie circles.

M/M romance also doesn't allow an author to approach a big publisher, so there's not even a chance to get those sweet advertising millions from one of the Big Few.

I've tried to find different solutions, but all of those facts are pretty much given and can't be changed or offset. 

So the future strategy will look as follows:

- I'll publish Burn This City on 13 September in Kindle Unlimited.

- I'll be focusing on translating my English language books into German, where I'll dump them into KU (it's the only game in town now, even though I still hate and detest Kindle Unlimited and will never love it). 

- I'll wrap up those books I have half written (i.e. one Witches of London book, one Return on Investment book, one Dark Soul book, and one historical WWII book), hopefully at a rate of one book a year. All new books will be dumped into KU.

- All old books that are already wide will remain wide - I'm not going to pull them from other retailers. I'll upload those to Radish and Smashwords and whatever other "wide" platforms appear.

- I'll sort out print editions for all books. My apologies about those, I avoided those because I couldn't get the layout right, but I'll renew my focus on that. 

- I'll properly reactivate my first German pseudonym. I've already restarted my networking in that market and building new relationships here with peers and old friends. Under that new old name, I'll return to my "home" genres, sci-fi, fantasy and historicals, with a focus on a mainstream audience. Main characters will be a mix of straight and queer, but the love plot will either be very small or non-explicit (mainstream audiences are turned off by explicit sex). 

It's pretty clear to me that I've failed to mix a non-romance plot with a romance plot in a way that satisfies both types of readers, and since I have no more energy to keep doing that same thing and hope that things change against all evidence to the contrary, I'll dial down the romance so it becomes a subplot. I still think some of my characters will be transformed by love, will make decisions out of love, and will be hurt and healed by love, I will also refrain from killing main characters (especially if they're queer), but it's time to move on from all the ambitious failures I've produced trying to square the circle.

Ultimately, I think I have to make a choice about what genres I want to write in - and remaining in m/m romance would mean writing tropey books that are laser focused on certain tropes and kinks. There's only one way to make it in m/m and that's writing a lot of books to trend very fast. I fail at all of those requirements, and even if I forced myself to do it, I know I would no longer enjoy writing, I'd likely write sub-par books (and lay awake at night as my inner perfectionist rips me apart for "phoning it in") before quitting writing altogether in utter disgust at myself and my work. 

So, it seems I have to choose between the genre I'm combining with m/m romance and m/m romance itself, because any combination would still make it primarily an m/m romance - except one that's way less appealing to an m/m reader than a "pure" m/m romance, if that makes sense. So the only way out of that dilemma and forward is to choose the other side - sci-fi, instead of sci-fi m/m romance. At least I can - even just potentially - reach a larger audience. And this is made easier because my home genres are becoming more open to queer characters - provided the sex and romance aren't that central in the book.

So, I can't help but feel that Burn This City will be my m/m swansong, and the themes in there, the imagery and symbolism and issues I'm addressing in that are literally where I am emotionally and spiritually, so I think it's as good, authentic book, at least once it's properly edited (the other genre in there is suspense/thriller).

I'll finish the books I have half-written and I will try to provide as much closure for ongoing story arcs and characters as I can - I'll do my best to clear the decks and leave the house nice and tidy - "besenrein" as we say in German - "broom clean"). The German market will have a few more years of m/m books from me as it'll take a while to get everything translated. And there will be a transition period of 2-3 years, but ultimately, I've given up on my ambitions to write the kind of m/m that I want to read, so I'll focus on writing the kind of fantasy, sci-fi and historicals I want to read. 

I have one bisexual poly romance I want to write and submit to a small publisher, and I might drop the occasional piece of m/m fanfic on AO3 if I feel like it and it really wants to be written. I also think I'll write a few book in German and may or may not translate them - I currently "hear" those voices in German, so German will be their first language. Lots of different avenues to take.

The new/old pseudonym will start out with a book series I'd describe as occult urban fantasy paranormal historical, and I expect to get that written and edited in 2022 - so pretty soon, really. I'll also make clear who the new pseudonym is so those of my readers who've enjoyed my voice and approach and are open to other genres can find me.

Waiting for beta feedback

I'm trying to be all organised with the current book - one big challenge has been to get beta feedback from people who are not overly invested ("objective") so I can look at the book with fresh eyes. I did send quite a few emails with the current manuscript to a range of people and set the deadline of 19 June.

The idea is to get as much and as varied feedback as possible (I didn't pre-select at all) and then review all feedback and build an action plan to fix those things that are actually problems rather than personal preferences. That's the part in the process where you saw off all the extra limbs and make sure things will be in proportion, and any plot holes are addressed. It's the structure part of the book, and definitely a separate pass. In traditional publishing, it would be called developmental edits - I call it the "bones". I have a few ideas myself, and will make a scene plan and a timeline and make sure it all hangs together logically - or is even possible.

Then I'll do an intermediate stage - looking at individual scenes and chapter structure. Does this chapter have a right to exist or can I collapse it into another one? This looks at tension, pacing, and scene-based conflict. This is also where I make sure that both POV characters have distinctive voices and don't overlap. This is the "muscles" stage of editing. 

There will be another stage where I'm just going to look at language and metaphor and how the words sound when they're actually spoken. This is also where I hope to chase down the last of the Britishisms (I write in an approximate generic American voice as both POV characters are from the US). Let's call this "skin, clothes, and make-up". 

Proofing happens kind of alongside this - obviously I'll fix all the stuff I spot on all of those passes - but there will also be proofreading from friends and I'll do what many indie authors do and try out some computer software to spot repetitive phrases across the whole manuscript. I do think that a computer is better at highlighting repetitive phraseology (which is one of my pet peeves and really difficult to spot for the human eye in a 100,000-word document).

I've also booked a paid editor as a second line of defense, but really 80-90% of the work should hopefully be done by the time I send her the book, so that pass should just be a general tidy-up. 

I'd say the first three stages will probably take 6-7 weeks, and I'm throwing in August as a buffer for further passes and changes.

This laundry list might horrify some people - I see so much talk of "publish now, fix mistakes later or never, publish, publish, PUBLISH, GO GO GO!" in indie circles (I've been reading a lot of samples outside of m/m, mostly het YA stuff and some het romance, spurred on by what I see being discussed in author groups on Facebook). What I see a *lot* is people publishing what are clearly raw drafts. That said, for many of them, this very much works and they make five and six figures per year that way. Of course, every writing making money and putting food on the table is a bloody hero.

I've worked out for myself that I want to publish books I'd pay to read, and I don't buy books for myself that clearly haven't been edited. It's a professional deformation - I just can't ignore poor prose and "just enjoy the story". I often wish I could. Every time I've compromised on this, I wasn't happy with the book and I've regretted cutting corners, and these regrets linger for decades.

So, next steps:

- pull together self-editing action plan based on my own "notes to self" during the writing and the round of beta feedback by 20/21 June

- Big picture/structural edits ("bones")

- Scene edits ("muscles")

- Line/word-level edits ("skin, clothes, make-up")

- Editor stage by end-July

- Proofreading and final clean-up during August

Still aiming for a release in September. Cover by Lady Tiferet has been commissioned, and I'm looking at writing the blurb so at least I can set up a link with the title and cover for pre-orders.

The title conundrum

 I'm actually pre-writing this on 24 May - today I've officially finished the first draft of The Book, by which I mean the current book.

I spent a couple hours batting around titles with friends because the book already had three working titles, ie "The Mafia Romance", "Jack & Sal", and finally "Dealmaker". For quite a while, Dealmaker looked like it would be the final title, because one of the character is one of the main fixers/dealmakers in my mafia-riddled little (fictional) city, and we start with his POV. 

Then a friend alerted me to "Deal Maker", a successful and well-regarded m/m romantic comedy published in 2017, and my book might be m/m and is structurally a romance, the tone is really quite different. 

Since then, we've gone through multiple potential titles, with the "emergency fallback" title literally "Mobster's Kiss". I also liked "Mobstertown" and "Lucky We Survived that Shit" (this one came up when I was asked to characterise the relationship between the MCs). One of the apparent rules of writing is to indicate the genre of the book with the title - and I'm really not very good at that part, but I guess I have a few more decades to get that one right. (The title for the next book, BTW has been set for 10 years or so and it's a banger and no-brainer.) 

I'm now about 80% set on a title and will roll that one around in my head for a week or so before I make it properly public and set up the book on Goodreads/Amazon/etc. 

Mostly I'm extremely jazzed to have the book done. My "easy, quick mafia romance that will be no longer than 50-60k because I don't have that much plot, lol" (which is how I've been talking about it to friends) topped out at 101k words in first draft and I'm still too close to really understand what this beastie is, but I sure enjoyed writing it a whole lot and I'm deeply in love with the characters. 

I'll be aiming to get it edited over the next 6 weeks and then publish at some point in September ((yes, this will be self-published). Stay tuned! 

In my defense, I'm writing

So I do apparently need to make a note in my calendar when I should blog. The pandemic/lockdowns have really messed with my perception of time. When I thought about blogging, I thought "I just did that" - but "just" was three weeks ago. 

In my defense, I'm at the stage in the book where I've basically upped sticks and am now living in my book. The characters are more real to me than people I've met in the flesh, and I'm both looking forward to being "done" and dreading it a little. It's a huge investment of energy and focus at this point in time, and I don't have capacity for much else that's also going on. 

So when I blogged three weeks ago, the book was standing at about 80k. I've been going at a solid clip and am now closing in on 97k. So this will be even longer than Mean Machine, which was already a beast. 

My characters are now weirdly adorable to each other. I think my favourite thing about this couple is that they communicate quite seriously and earnestly and are smart enough to really nail down what's going on and how they feel. I've at times written avoidant characters, but these guys feel grown up and mature and they totally deserve their happy ending. 

Then I was approached by a budding writer today to talk about writing. And since that's one of my other favourite things to do in my life, I'm thinking I might go back to developing a workshop to be held over Zoom or Discord to help writers. I might charge a nominal fee (£5/10) or go completely free on this and just take donations (as the pandemic has hit lots of people pretty badly). I'm going to think about that some more, but basically I've always enjoyed teaching/mentoring writers and want to get back into it.

In any case, the book will get done before the end of the month. I know there's going to be 2-3 large scenes of 1-2k each left and that's it. Beyond that, I only see black, so the inner movie is done after that. June will be the month when I clean up the book and get the book off to editors and betas. I'm thinking September could be a good release month - it's the time when the book is set, so that would suit it quite nicely. I'm also still pondering titles, hence I'm just talking about "the book" here for the moment. But - things are moving in the right direction. For the moment, I'm trying to build back up to one novel per year and then speed up again once I've handed in my resignation at the day job. 

Almost there

I'm kind of hoping to blog weekly about the book's progress. The original idea was to get the book done by 4 May (my birthday) with an expected wordcount of 80,000 words. Well, I hit the wordcount, but not the deadline - I still have quite a bit of plot left at currently 81,500, so I'm now expecting a 90,000-word book and a new deadline of mid-May. 

So much for "I'm writing a quick 50-60k romance". 

But I'm really enjoying the work right now, and it's generally going well, with a solid amount of days where I write 2,000 or 3,000 words, hence my hope to finish the book in the next 5-10 days. 

I've also lined up editing, and am just off the Zoom with Tiferet, who's designed all my covers and will handle this one, so the idea is to self-publish it at some point after June, but before October, with the exact date likely set once I have a feeling that this is the best I can make the book. Even with my level of perfectionism, there comes a point where I can't find any more issues, and any additional self-editing pass just means digging up some stones and then burying them a few yards to the left or right, so it becomes pointless.  

Meanwhile, it's a pretty odd beast. I was discussing how strange the book is with my alpha reader, and she allowed me to share her comments with you:

“Hi, my name is Aleks and I’ve written a... romance... <.< where a Boss kidnaps and tortures another Boss’s Consigliere, only they kind of fall in love during the torture, and now they’re. Together. Kind of.”
“And my beta reader is in love with both of the characters, but doesn’t have a clue how to market it either, because the romance is all twisted up in deep feelings, and it’s more of an abiding love than superficial romance—everything hurts and then it’s all gorgeous, blissful happiness in the middle of all these really dark elements, memories, and actions.”
“Also, the boss is slightly feral, and the consigliere is a gentleman, but they’re both broken-hearted, and they just... fit. Beautifully.”

So yeah, that's what I'm writing - "everything hurts and then it's all blissful happiness". 

Hope to report in in a week with a (messy) first draft completed. Meanwhile, I'm also hanging around on Discord here, and posting snippets, etc (they're too long for Twitter and vanish on Facebook). 

Is this thing on?

First things first: the pandemic has been pretty good to me. I started a new side gig doing translations, and I'm apparently back in the saddle in terms of writing. Just not having that commute has been a super positive change in my life and overall stress levels. And last week, I got my first AstraZeneca shot - the second shot is 10 weeks away - so I should be able to travel again in about 13 weeks. 

Between October and now, I've also written about 70,000 words of a new book. I've actually written more than that, but those are fragments - this book looks like it's actually going to happen, and fairly soon. I'm in the last 10-15k or so, the stage I like to call "bringing the herd home" - getting everything to a satisfying end, wrapping up sub-plots, etc. The goal is to have a reasonably clean first draft at my birthday, and then hand it off for editing, so currently casting about for editing talent. 

I'm just keenly aware that this is going to be the first all-new solo book since Witches of London - Lars, which was published in 2016, and really the main reason why very little has happened is that the day job plus commute just drained me. Plus, of course, a couple crises of confidence and a complete re-organisation of my creative life - where to publish, how to publish, and more importantly, why and what. 

I've looked at classes and so. much. advice about writing faster and "making it" in the new e-book environment, but none of it works for me. Thanks to Becca Syme and her Write Better Faster platform, I also know why - I'm just wired in a way that makes this "rapid release" stuff impossible and actively destructive to me.

(And there will be esteemed colleague who read this and go "balderdash! Everybody can write a book in a month if they want it enough, if they need to pay bills, if they're properly disciplined, etc ..." but I'm going with "Know Thyself", and I've spent a lot of time to try and tweak my process - ending up in a place that's no longer creative, immersive or even fun.)  

As an example - the current WIP. I started this in October as a "fun side project", while I was working on my mainstream genre novel. It was going to be my take on "mafia romance", darker than Dark Soul, proper "dark romance".

Yeah. One of my beta readers has described it as "a surprisingly uplifting, warm novel about family". I'd add it's an exploration of self-worth and authenticity, but the main thrust stands. It's not the thing I thought it would be. The characters gathered too much depth, too much soul, too much baggage for a simple dark thrill. And the dark stuff - didn't really happen. The characters just didn't go that far. Too much empathy at play. It's still very much "enemies to lovers", but instead of a simple book I had a complex book - that has so far taken six months to write and should soon be finished.

While I still can't quite walk away from the day job (but I'm getting much closer), that's going to be the modus operandi in Casa Voinov - I'll focus on one book at a time and just write it the way it wants to be, regardless of tropes or marketing or genres. I was originally going to throw this up on Kindle Unlimited, but I don't think this is the kind of book that does well there, and I continue to loathe and despise KU anything. Mostly I'll have to find a way to finance editing and cover. That'll become a much larger consideration once I do walk away from the day job, so I'll need a solution I can use again and again afterwards.

But for the moment, I'm happy to be writing again, and I'm hoping to be blogging about the process again - likely just short updates, mostly so I can look back how far I've come and also so you know what I've been up to. 

Splitting into three

Spent the day soul-searching, and went over ground I've already covered. I've spent a few weeks with Becca Symes' YouTube videos (and books, and Patreon, and Write Better Faster Academy), and I didn't necessarily like the conclusions I've reached. So, in order to change what I didn't like, I went through it again. And again. Just to make sure that all the factors still sum up to the number I've reached that first time around.

I've discussed this with several writer and non-writer friends, who helped confirm inklings I've had. I've always had that voice whisper to me, ever since about 2014, when I hit a point that I'd summarise with "And now what?" I pushed it away, and then I got busy with a different book. And then I got that day job that made a lot of those thoughts complete moot.

It's become very clear I'm just not really as much at ease in the genre I'm currently writing. A consultant would use expressions like "not competitive", but for me it's never been about competition. I'm not competing with anybody but myself. I've sadly once or twice come across people in the genre who were determined to "beat me" (on whatever measures I don't know - they were making 5-10x the money I was making even in my heydays), and it's really weird to be a team player when others are obsessed about "beating you". It's like somebody jogging next to you with gritted teeth and clenched fists.

Part of this is that I've just done my 2019/20 taxes for my company. I'm actually financing writing from my day job income at this point. I'm not making a profit. This is the second year running. It's one reason why I'm now translating books into German (and into English) - I make (much) more money translating other writers' words than writing my own. Writing won't get me out of the day job - translating is much more likely to do that.

The way the industry is structured - click farms, ghostwriter stables, "minimum viable product", people unwilling (and sadly often unable) to pay for ebooks - the model I've been running won't work. It's nonsense to believe that if I keep doing what I'm doing, that things will turn around. Meanwhile, I can't (and won't) compromise on the quality.

As Einstein said, the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over and expect different results.

The only thing left for me to do is to do something else.

1) I'll keep writing the weird m/m books under this name, because I quite frankly enjoy doing it. I'll have to re-jig my expenses in 2020/21 so I stop financing the writing with the day job. I can't afford to do that, quite frankly. I'm not going to schedule any books, though, and I can't promise any specific books at least until I've phased out the day job and freed up some time and energy.

2) I'll translate my existing books into German when there's a hole in my translation schedule.

3) I'm starting up a mainstream pseudonym to write fantasy and science fiction in German and English. The vote is still out whether it'll be a name I've used before or a new one. I'll likely link that name back to "Aleksandr Voinov" so you can find them and read them - they'll just not be explicit romances, though might contain some romantic elements. Or they might just be straight, and "diverse" books. Depends a bit on what happens.

4) I'll go "play". There will be 1-2 names that won't be linked back to this name. It'll be KU exclusive and it'll be just about quickly generating an income by quickly writing a lot of books. I don't expect any of those will be m/m. It's pure "work for hire", "hit the tropes", "don't worry about anything else", writing. That name may do ghostwriting for others (not sure about the rates) or be a co-writer for hire, but the general idea is to quickly build a backlist and earn some cash so I can quit the day job. I have friends who are already doing it coaching me through that process and it's a fun challenge to try. If it fails, I'll just write off the books, and do something else.

It's just clear that I need to break the pattern and do something else. 

Masterful Plot/Character: Warrior Nun

I have been bingeing Warrior Nun on Netflix. My partner wasn't too convinced about trying it, but after one episode he thought it was interesting, and after two episodes he suggested the next evening we should continue it. Somewhere in the middle we were fully invested.

I believe that both good and bad stories can teach us a lot about how to do our books/stories. I'd recommend Warrior Nun as a good example.

The thing I want to talk about specifically is the payoff.

Because, boy, what a payoff.

(Now, if you haven't seen the show and don't want to get spoilered, go, watch it, then come back.)

In some ways, of course it's a YA story and has quite a few cliches, but it's acted with heart and filmed well, the characters are interesting, and it's frankly refreshing to see so many women/girls on screen driving the plot. I was also really into how the debate "science versus religion" was handled, with the "rational people" not nearly fully rational (or even driven by rationality) and the religious people no crusading fanatics by any means. Excellent mix of grey here, no whites and blacks. A worse writer could have completely ruined that, but the mix was compelling.

But what really blew me away was the payoff.

We spend a lot of time in what at first felt like the "debate" beat - the "will she/won't she" moment of "will she accept her destiny or live selfishly etc". Ava has all reasons to not want to become the Warrior Nun - her experiences with religion aren't exactly positive (a nun tried to euthanise her), and quite frankly, she's a teenager and likes cute boys and partying and running along the beach (considering she's been confined to a room all of her her life). It's "faith versus fun". "Self-focus versus "team player". She has good reasons to be selfish, of course, considering she's been on her own from an early age. We also know from the start that she cares about people.

She's rebellious, she's a smart-arse, she questions authority, and very much has her own ideas. She's a tricky customer to have if you're a medieval demon-fighting order of Catholic nuns who know she's the Chosen One. Many think she was chosen by accident, and some decide that her chosen status needs to be taken away so the order can move on and fulfill its purpose. Clearly, somebody who takes her super powers and runs away with the cute boy instead of meekly serving her new purpose is a big fat problem.

Over the course of the last few episodes, we see her "accept her destiny" (though she's doing it very much on her own terms, in part inspired by "Shotgun" Mary). She marries "fun" and "faith" - clearly enjoying the company and friendship of the other nuns, as well as the "mission" to find the tomb of the angel (for reasons).

This is when the big question is answered. Ava (from her perspective) faces the choice to return the "halo" to the trapped angel (who's alive in the tomb). Her compassion for those who are trapped and betrayed (as she was) wars with her dis-belief (the person she sees down there has been alive for a thousand years while trapped in a small cave, so hard to explain that with science), and, from what she knows, he's been betrayed and the halo that gives her super powers is actually rightfully his and will restore him to full angelic power.

On the other hand, she has reason to believe that returning it will kill her or at least return her to her previous state (quadriplegic, no super powers, unable to walk or move or escape that tomb). And how smart to set this in a tomb - these choices always happen in caves, archetypically, with Luke Skywalker meeting Darth Vader in the cave on Dagobah for the first time.

This is when we realise that any other of the nuns would have given the angel the halo back. They're Christians who've been trained to follow the hierarchy, despite their personal misgivings. Any other halo bearer would have (we get to assume). But not Ava. Her rebelliousness and general mistrust of authority - as well as a well-developed ego - make her go "hang on a minute". Luckily, the halo also gives her access to visions of the actual history.

Turns out, whatever the immortal guy is, he's not an angel.

The whole scene could be taught as part of a master class in writing. The deepest structures of the main character working synergistically with the all-important question of the plot. The big decision of the story is answered in one specific way like only the heroine can. We know she'd give up the halo (at the cost of her life/health/freedom), but her ego and her strength to question what's put before her allow her to pull back from the brink and realise it's not redemption or liberation, but truly the Cave of Death.

We know she's the "Chosen One" because all other nuns would have given up the halo. And other humans simply wouldn't have gotten far enough to get asked the question in the first place, since it took the halo's powers and a super human effort to get there. Or rather - we know she's special. We also know that she appears to be the "Chosen One" to others. On a different level, she's a strong person making the best of a weird situation and retaining her agency against overwhelming odds. It's been some of the most riveting minutes of visual story telling I've seen in a long time.

(The episode then ends with a Major Character Betrayal, and just before a big fight, so it's a nasty cliffhanger, but I'd strongly recommend watching the show for the "scene in the tomb" alone. I've rarely seen it done so well.)