K. Tempest Bradford's Blog, page 37

Wiscon 35: Safer Space for POC – Ideas, Discussion

As part of my duties for the WisCon 35 programming committee, I've been put in charge (officially) of the Safer Space for POC at the con. Essentially they'd like me to address any issues the community has with said space and make it as useful and comfortable as it can be. Thus, I'm opening up the discussion here to make sure I address issues I'm not aware of. Hopefully, even though this is online, we'll get a mostly representative mix of ideas and concerns.

First thing: the Safer Space is still in the Solitaire Room this year, just like last year. I remember hearing people complain that this ended up being a detriment as it is so out of the way. However, it's too late at this point to move it this year. Next year, perhaps. The reason it ended up in the Solitaire Room (from what I understand) was to cut down on gawkers.

One solution to this issue is to plan events and meetups in the space to encourage people to come. And I wouldn't mind having a lunch together again. The concom also said they'd look into having a coffee/tea service in the room.

So, my question to the WisCon-attending POC out there is: how can we make this room more useful to you beyond the basic function? Are there things you want to happen that didn't last year? Events you want to see continue? Suggestions, comments, issues, cookies in the comments below! However, if there's anything you'd like to bring up with me privately, please use the contact form on my website if you don't know my email or message me on Facebook. I can keep your concerns private/anonymous if need be.

Wiscon 35: Safer Space for POC – Ideas, Discussion is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Today Marks The Beginning of my 33rd Year On This Earth

33! That's all kinds of 3s, so this year is about to be extra special.

*boogie down*

Today Marks The Beginning of my 33rd Year On This Earth is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Oh Hey, My Stories Finally Made It To The Big Booksellers

As promised, I'm keeping everyone abreast of my dealings with SmashWords so as to give my impression of the process. Back in December I published a short story (actually, a novelette) through their site which was immediately available via SmashWords but took some time to make it through distribution channels. SW will send your eBook to Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Sony, iBooks and Diesel on their behalf as the publisher. It sometimes takes a while. Now my book is in all of those stores except for Amazon, as there's some kind of renegotiation going on with them overall.

Anyway, I did a search and found the book in each place except iBooks (can't get there from the web) and linked them above. So now phase 2 is over.

Thus far, 50 people have downloaded the except of the story (free) and only 3 have bought it. However, I haven't done any promotion beyond this blog yet, mainly because I was waiting for the distribution thing to happen. However, I've learned a few things already:

I suck at writing jacket copy.
My cover is all right, but it's not stunning, and thus probably not driving many sales.

These things I knew before, but seem particularly important now that I'm considering publishing more stories in this manner.I'm trying to take more time to work on these aspects in the next iteration so that when people do land on the page, they're enticed to click. I recognize the limits in this area as I am not an artist or book designer or copy writer, cannot afford a decent artist or book designer or copy writer, and would have to consider very carefully employing their services if I did. After all, I'm not going to make much money off of these stories no matter what.

The next step is being a little more aggressive in the promotional area. But not overly so. I'm dipping toes in the water here to work out what's best for this kind of fiction. I may even wait until I have all the stories I plan to release this way (for now) in the SmashWords catalog at least.

Any thoughts, Internets?

Oh Hey, My Stories Finally Made It To The Big Booksellers is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Keeping First Drafts

As I've mentioned elsewhere, last week I was on a writing retreat with some awesome folks. I am finishing up my YA novel (finally, I know) and plowing through the revisions and edits I've settled on now that the new material is out of the way. At one point I realized that I needed a snippet of description from an earlier draft of the novel and didn't have it in my current files. I think I may have overwritten it accidentally. Fie. So I went over to my first draft journal to see if it still lived there.

Having a first draft journal is awesome, can I just say. Not only is it good as an extra backup, but it's interesting (at least for me) to see how my stories and novels change over time from the first stuff that comes out of my head to the version I eventually send out to editors. Looking back at the journal I see the insane struggle it was for me to write the beginning of this novel. I must have a dozen false starts. Makes me feel all the better for finally getting it out in a form I'm happy with.

I did eventually find my snipped of description and added to the new version which is now very nearly complete.

It's nice to live in the future…

Keeping First Drafts is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Tempest in da Bay Area

All right, folks. I will be in San Francisco this afternoon and hanging out in Mountain View until Friday. There are some plans afoot for Friday and Wednesday. Possibly something for tonight. But right now I'm honestly not sure how I'm getting from the airport to my hotel.

At any rate, ping me on Facebook or Twitter (@tinytempest) if you want to meet up for dinner or something!

Tempest in da Bay Area is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

In San Francisco Next Week

Very quick:

I'm going to be in San Francisco next week for a Google announcement. Work is flying me out there and paying for my hotel on Tuesday night. However, because of the cost, I'm flying back on Friday afternoon.

So I'm looking for a place to stay Wednesday and Thursday night. I have to work remotely on Thursday and on Wednesday I'll need to get from Mountain View to wherever I'm staying, but that can happen in the evening (I'll be at Google headquarters for most of the afternoon then in the hotel lobby trying to write everything after that). And I guess I'll need some help figuring out how to get to the airport on Friday. I'm not afraid to take public transit, I just need explicit directions.

If anyone has room for me and it's not too much of a burden, let me know. I'll be entertaining in the evenings, I swear!

In San Francisco Next Week is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It- OW!

Yesterday all of the news sources I knew of predicted that we'd get just 5 – 9 inches of snow overnight. Then  again, those same sources also said it wouldn't start snowing until the afternoon. Judging by the inch of accumulation before I left the house at 9am, someone was clearly wrong.

I woke up this morning at 5 in order to go to the gym. I turned on WNYC and, lo, the news dude was all: "There's 15 inches of snow in Central Park." I looked out of my window at the courtyard of my building and, lo, it seems we got at least that much of here, too. Fabulous.

Thus, the gym was out, because none of the sidewalks had even begun to be shoveled and even walking down the middle of the somewhat plowed street was precarious. How do I know these things? I went out just to assess how bad things were and this is what greeted me at the front door:

Here's the scene from the bottom of the stairs:

I attempted to make my way down those stairs. But, due to the near foot of snow and the impacted bits from others who were forced to leave their homes, every stair was a death trap. I fell down around the third step. Thankfully, a foot plus of snow is very soft. However, I wrenched my back attempting to not fall. Good times!

Since I was already down, I took a bunch of pictures of my street and the cross street. Note the "plowed" street, which is still unpassable unless you have 4 wheel drive. And the poor people who live up that hill…

Good thing I can work from home.

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It- OW! is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

End of Year Donating

A few years ago I read a post by Jed Hartman wherein he listed all of the various organizations and charities he donates money to, usually at the end of the year. I've rarely been in a financial position to be a generous donor — one of the reasons I volunteer my time, instead — but this year I have a small bit of extra money and some worthy entities I want to support. And since I can never keep my mouth shut about the things I'm passionate about, I shall also take this opportunity to encourage you to join me in supporting them. It's only a slightly evil plan, I know. Next time I will do better.

First up: It's just been a few weeks since the Carl Brandon eReader Drawing fundraiser ended, so you might be a bit burned on this one. However, the Society is in the midst of another fund drive, this time to benefit their general fund. SF3 — the parent org of WisCon — recently awarded CBS a $2000 challenge grant. That means they will match any donations made in December and January up to $2K. The Drawing didn't count toward this since all the money we raised in November is earmarked for the Butler Scholarship. Any general fundraising will support other activities of the Society, including the Parallax and Kindred awards. You can make a donation via PayPal here. However, if you send a check to the address on that page, CBS gets to keep more of your donation.

Next: If you've used Wikipedia any time in the last few months you probably noticed the banner at the top asking for donations. They are apparently within 1.1 million of reaching their goal, and I intend to donate. I know a lot of people scoff at Wikipedia, but I find it to be an incredibly useful resource for some information. I am on the site at least once a day, usually more. And having written an article about Wikipedia lately, I have an even greater appreciation of how important it's become and how much work the Wikimedia Foundation puts into the site. Click here to donate.

Finally: As much as NPR sometimes makes me roll my eyes, I have to admit that public radio is a constant part of my life. I wake up to it every morning, I'm always downloading podcasts, and I've even been a guest. So I'm going to send a bit of change to WNYC and WBAI (which is Pacifica, not NPR). And, who knows, someday you might hear me on the radio begging you to send us money so we can continue operating. I promise, I will not be as annoying or horrifying as Ira Glass.

End of Year Donating is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Thrilling Thrillers That Thrill

I was catching up on my blog reading yesterday when I came across an old entry on Query Shark. If you follow it, you probably remember this from earlier in the month:

Scott Harris gets the shock of a lifetime while burglarizing the Mayor's home when he moves to the cellar and finds a tortured prostitute shackled within a catacomb of horrors, and documents entailing a vicious plot to take over the U.S. government.

Reading this engendered such a violent bout of hysterical laughter that I had to put down my Samsung Galaxy Tab(tm), otherwise I would have dropped it. I still haven't recovered, and now my chest hurts. Immediately following this is a note from the query mistress that this sentence would have caused her to stop reading right away. But since I'm not an agent, I was eager to continue. The query just gets more and more WTF as it goes along. Another favorite bit from the post:

Query: As a result, Scott now has Orlando's most dogged investigator, Detective Stone, hunting him like a voracious hawk coming in for the kill. This leads to an exhilarating game of wits as Scott continues to steal, barely escaping the relentless pursuit of Stone.

Agent: None of this has anything to do with what you said in the first paragraph. Added to the list of things I don't believe: a game of wits with an Oxycontin addict.

Right on.

I'm kind of amazed at this person's ability to string together so many wildly improbable scenarios into one narrative. Even though the query isn't great and the book sounds dubious, I feel like there's an inkling of something there, if only someone would get this person to stop piling it on in an effort to create THE MOST THRILLING THRILLER THAT EVER THRILLED, THRILLA!

Thrilling Thrillers That Thrill is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford

Zira's Heart, Shannon's Life Force, and Tempest's Back

Several bits of fictiony news for you! First, I'm experimenting with self-publishing short stories as eBooks just to see what the process is like and to feel out interest in this arena. I have no plans to completely abandon sending my stories out to magazines and such. But there are a few stories that I love and still believe are good, but I've run out of markets for them. One such is Zira's Heart, which is a bit too long for most markets. So, I decided to submit it to Smashwords and get it listed in most major eBook stores to see how that goes.

Shorts never receive the same kind of attention that books get in these situations, but I still think it could be interesting (and fun). I uploaded it last night and it's already in the Smashwords catalog. Now I'm waiting to see if they'll accept it for distribution to Amazon, B&N, iBooks and the like. I put the cover and link up on the sidebar of my site and I'm tracking how many clicks it gets. I'll report as time goes on.

In other news, I don't know why but I keep forgetting to blog about my first Escape Pod story! Elan Vital, which first appeared in Sybil's Garage no 6, was podcasted in Escape Pod and read by Mur Lafferty. I'm completely excited to have cracked that market and really glad Mur is the editor now, as I enjoy her other podcasts quite a bit.

I did not intend to actually listen to the piece since I always get emotional even looking at that story. But as several people had praised Mur's reading of it, I decided to listen to just a little. I ended up listening to the entire thing (crying almost the whole time, arg). Mur is fantastic, as others have said. She strikes the perfect notes all the way through. I'm so lucky! All of my Escape Artists stories have been read by such excellent and talented people[1].

The discussion about my story is filled with people saying they really loved it (squee!) and some who bounced off hard. I am amused, however, by the person who said early on that the story "isn't science fiction". Also amused by the person who pointed out that, whatever happens in the future, he is sure companies will always find ways to charge us subscription fees. Too right.

Over at the Biology in Science Fiction blog, the poster asks "What would you be willing to give to keep someone you love alive?" which is more the center of my story than the actual science. I do enjoy some hard SF now and then. But I'm int he camp of people who think that the science or technology in SF is meant to serve the characters and the plot and the idea, not the other way around. Too much Star Trek as a child?

And finally, this weekend I went to Macy's in my quest to find a new mattress (as described here) on the advice of those who said they had great deals. Those people? Have a weird idea of what constitutes a great deal. Nothing below $1,000 in the quality I need, and salespeople who didn't even want to admit that they might be able to sell me a mattress without a box spring. They looked horrified that I should want such a thing. My old box spring is clearly inferior to anything they have. Cue eyeroll.

PayPal being under attack by Anonymous affected a couple of family members from donating to my mattress fund last week, but I think that's over now. Yay? I haven't even looked at the account yet since a bunch of people sent me a note saying they wouldn't be able to send money until next week or so, which is fine. I'm going to ask my new roommate to help me flip my current mattress tonight and try to sleep on the less fucked up side so that my back will stop screaming at me in the night.

Here's what I don't get: how did we, as humans, survive all this time without natural latex memory foam individually-wrapped coil mattresses? I mean, this is crazy. There must be a solution for sleeping that is not bad for your back and also comfortable. Also one that does not cost $600+. Fie.

Footnotes

Yeah, that's right, Amal. I am talkin' about you. Whatcha gunna do about it, huh?

Zira's Heart, Shannon's Life Force, and Tempest's Back is a post from: K. Tempest Bradford