Marko Kloos's Blog, page 3

Our combination anniversary getaway/working vacation

 

Last weekend, the wife and I went to Quebec City for three days to celebrate our anniversary (21 years!), recharge our batteries, and plan out some new stories together. We stayed at a nice hotel in the old city, went to the German Christmas Market and did some shopping, ate fantastic meals, and generally had a wonderful time in one of the most beautiful places on the continent. 

We came back with detailed outlines for five books–a brand new science fiction trilogy and two more Frontlines: Evolution installments–so I’d say the mission was an unqualified success. It was great to be able to bounce new ideas off each other away from the distractions and interruptions of our regular everyday lives. I think we’ll make these planning sessions a regular event from now on.

Oh, and Quebec City is amazing. This was my third time there and I’ve enjoyed every minute of every trip. It’s the city that has the most European feel of any place I’ve visited in North America. The people are uniformly friendly and very forgiving of my lousy French, the food is stellar, and it’s great to be able to make an international trip by car instead of having to put up with holiday season airline travel. It’s just a five-hour drive from our place, and we had all the advantages of being able to haul our own stuff and take back food and souvenirs without having to worry about space or luggage allowances.

Whoopsie

 

That’s how the last week has been going for me. How was yours?

Kid #1 put the Jeepito in the ditch as he was leaving for work. Not really his fault—the conditions were pretty bad, and the road was treacherous even for an experienced driver. But it definitely kicked off a chain of work-disrupting events for me.

I had it yanked out by a tow truck, and at first I thought there was no damage done. Going up the hill back to the house, however, the 4×4 refused to kick in when the front wheels slipped, and I slid all the way back down the hill in reverse. Turns out the transfer case is busted, so now the 4×4 is strictly FWD until it gets fixed. That’s a major repair, and I still don’t have a quote on it from the transmission guy, so we’re down to one car at the moment. And the attendant calls, arrangements, dealing with two different garages, and tentatively looking for a new set of wheels ate up a lot of my writing time and peace of mind over the last week. 

Oh, well. Life happens, and at least nobody got hurt. Everything else can be fixed.

That ol’ pen-and-paper business

 

There are days when my brain simply locks up when I have my fingers on a keyboard and my eyes on a blinking cursor on a screen. 

I wrote the first two Frontlines novels by hand in A4-sized unlined notebooks. Then I got a publishing contract, and the deadlines involved required a faster pace of production than I could do by hand because the transcription step doubled the time involved. So I did what everyone else does and wrote on a laptop—mostly MacBooks with Scrivener and Word on them. But even though I write the novels on a computer, I still take all my story notes by hand, and I write most shorter fiction longhand as well. My brain just seems to work better when I have a pen in my hand. You can cross out stuff but still see your corrections instead of hitting backspace and sending the corrected word or phrase into oblivion. 

Best of all, it doesn’t really feel like work. Typing is kind of a drudgery for me, but handwriting has a meditative sort of quality that really quiets my mind and gets me in the flow. (There’s also the fact that a notebook or legal pad doesn’t have an Internet connection to distract me.)

The scribbling on the legal pad in the picture is a draft of new jacket copy for CORVUS, the second volume in the Frontlines: Evolution series. You can see where I crossed out words and wrote in substitutions. And if you can read my handwriting, you now know the general gist of the novel, which is due out in June. This is what will end up as the marketing copy on the back of the book (for the paperback version) and the product page on Amazon. I wasn’t quite happy with the promotional text written by the publisher, so I gave them an alternate version to use instead.

(The pen is a Lamy Safari, which is a great and affordable workhorse fountain pen.)

 

07OCT2024

The developmental edits for CORVUS, second volume in the Frontlines: Evolution series, are finished and turned in. My developmental editor is excited about this book and says it’s my best one yet, so I hope it’ll land well with readers when it comes out in August.

(For those of you wondering why it can’t be released sooner if the edits are done already—the manuscript will get a few copyedit passes now, the cover art needs to be commissioned, and then the audiobook version needs to be scheduled and recorded. It takes time to get all the moving parts coordinated.)

It’s the best time of the year here in upper New England—temperatures in the sixties, sunshine, and the turning leaves of early autumn popping their colors everywhere. My personal idea of paradise has this kind of weather year-round. October is my favorite month, and that’s not just because it’s my birth month. It’s nature’s last deep breath before the onset of the cold season, which feels like it lasts half the year up here sometimes. I’ll be getting out the snow shovels and gassing up the snowblower soon enough, but for now I am enjoying the sunshine and the crisp fall air.

I am working on a secret project right now. Once that’s turned in, I’ll spend the rest of the year on Palladium Wars #5, which should be ready for Kindle Direct and paperback sometime in the first quarter of next year. Since 47North declined to continue the series, I’m limited to a Kindle and paperback release until I’ve squared the audio rights away separately with Audible or another party. (Watch this spot for updates.)

 

The public lives of writers (and the urge to comment thereon)

When I was in Glasgow for Worldcon, I shared a few pictures on my Instagram account. Among them were shots of the full Scottish breakfast I got to use as fuel for the day.

Someone commented on the post that I should “eat less and write more.” I’m sure the person who left that comment had no ill intent and meant it as a compliment of sorts, but it still rubbed me the wrong way just a little bit.

What I do—what all writers I know do as well—is informed and fueled by our lives. We synthesize our personal experiences and perspectives and turn them into fiction. In order to do that well, we have to, you know, live our lives. I do most of my work in a room by myself with just me and the screen or the notebook in front of me. Whenever I don’t work, I need to step out into life and refill those experience bars again, and I also like to meet old friends and eat good food because those are the sort of things that sustain me and keep me at my desk the rest of the time. In fact, whenever I go without them too long, I feel my writing dropping in quality because it’s not healthy to live almost exclusively in your own head and let those socialization and experience bars go down to nothing. The trip to Glasgow was, in fact, only my second trip of the entire year, and the only one that was work-related. I got to see writer friends I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic, and it was a much-overdue event for my mental health.

When you tell me to cut out enjoying that part of my life and go back to my office, you irritate me and spoil my enjoyment, and you make me pull back from sharing my life in public in order to avoid getting irritated and having my joy spoiled. It’ll also make my work less enjoyable in the long run because I’ll eventually suffer a creative slump or burnout if I am locked in the office by myself all year. Neither of those outcomes are in any way positive for either you or me.

I guess what I am trying to get across is this—writers are not vending machines, so please don’t treat your favorite authors as such, even if it implies that you love our writing so much that you’d rather we never did anything else so you can get your fictional treats more quickly. We need time to restock so you won’t be stuck with the stale novella in slot C5 that’s been put there without much care by a tired and overworked brain. Please think before you comment, and let us have a life outside of work as well without making us feel bad for it.

A belated Worldcon souvenir

I made it for over a week after Scotland and all the attendant travel, but it looks like the Worldcon COVID wave has finally caught up with me. (My wife tested positive on the weekend and has been mildly sick ever since, so I knew it would only be a matter of time.)

The weird thing is that I tested negative all week including just yesterday. Alas, this isn’t the first time for me, so I’ll do what I did before–get Paxlovid, take it easy, and drink lots of water. I feel fine right now, and if this round is like the last one, I’ll feel a little crappy for two days and then be mostly fine for the rest of the week.

 

The future of The Palladium Wars

I guess I ought to share the news I mentioned regarding the Palladium Wars. Unfortunately, it’s not all sunshine and roses.

47North has decided not to continue the series. I don’t know the reasoning behind the decision because they did not share it with me, and it doesn’t matter in the end whether it was sales numbers, budget issues, new editorial direction, or none of the above. The bottom line is that Palladium Wars #5 (the “E” novel, for those of you following the alphabetical naming order) will not be published by 47North.

That doesn’t mean it won’t be published at all, of course. I don’t intend to chop the series off at four installments without a satisfying conclusion. What it does mean is that I’ll most likely have to self-publish future installments. There’s always the possibility that my agent will find a new home for Palladium Wars, but the odds of that happening are very slim. It’s highly unlikely that any house will want to take on Book Five in a series they don’t own completely.

I’m not new to the self-publishing game, so I don’t have a problem with the prospect. I’ll have to hire my own editor and cover artist, of course, and the book will be available on Kindle and in paperback, but the audio version will depend on either my agent selling the audio rights to Audible (an easier proposition than selling the series rights to another house altogether), or me hiring an audiobook narrator for the job. All of this means expenses out of pocket for me, and good narrators and cover artists do not come cheap. I’ve thought about doing a Kickstarter for the fifth installment, but I’m not fully sold on the idea yet, and I may just decide to eat the expenses instead of asking readers to commit to a pre-buy like that.

(Self-publishing would mean there’d be no pre-orders because there’s no way to do those on KDP, so I’d be flying blind as to potential reader interest, and I may end up holding the bag fronting the production costs.)

Sorry I can’t give you better news on that particular front. I am very fond of the series (I think it’s superior to Frontlines in many ways), but I also recognize that the stars haven’t always been aligned for it. I had the distinct misfortune to get four different audiobook narrators for the four books in the series, and that’s been a cause for a lot of negative reviews even though there’s precisely nothing I could have done about the situation. (To recap: Luke Daniels didn’t have time in his schedule for the second book, Angelo DiLoreto untimely passed away before the third book came out, and Korey Jackson…well, maybe I’ll get to that in a later post. The fourth artist, Seth Podowitz, may or may not be available as an independent hire, so we’ll see whether we end up keeping our streak of a different narrator for every book. Hey, at least we’d be consistent on that front.)

That’s the current state of The Palladium Wars for you. I fully intend to write Book 5, and unless it finds another home in the meantime, I’ll be making it available on the Kindle and in paperback formats once it’s done, but right now that’s all I can tell you with any certainty.

 

CORVUS draft and Worldcon after-action report

As you can tell from the progress bar in the sidebar to the right, I have finished the first draft of CORVUS, the second installment in the Frontlines: Evolution series. It’s with the editor now, and I’ll see it again in a few weeks to begin the developmental edits, but for now it’s off my desk.

I spent a long weekend in Glasgow, Scotland, where I attended the Alfie awards dinner thrown by George R.R. Martin, honoring the authors whose works had been inexplicably punted off the shortlist by the powers in charge at the Chengdu Worldcon last year. I also spent much of Saturday at the con, where I got to meet up with some old friends I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic, so that was lovely. The travel itself was another story altogether. I took the draft of CORVUS with me to finish it on the way (spoiler warning–I didn’t finish it on the way), and deadline stress plus travel anxiety combined into a new and special cocktail of stress that I wouldn’t wish on anyone. But I finished the draft in my hotel room on Friday, literally two hours before the awards dinner, and everything was much more fun and relaxing once I hit “Send” on that email to my editor and agent.

In the wake of the con, a lot of people reported testing positive for COVID, including a good friend with whom I spent time at a pub on Saturday night, and several people who went to the same awards dinner I attended. I’ve tested negative three times since Sunday and I feel fine, so I hope I made it through a busy con and two packed airports without catching it.

I got back on Monday and took the last few days to recover from the combination of travel and deadline stress, but now it’s back to work. I have a project to keep me busy until I get the editor notes for CORVUS back, but I can’t disclose that one yet, so you’ll have to take my word for it that it’ll be cool and awesome.

Once I turn in this secret project, my schedule for the rest of the year consists of writing Palladium Wars #5, which doesn’t have a name yet. I aim to have that one done by the end of December, for a release in the first quarter of next year. I have news on the future of the Palladium Wars series, but that’s a matter for another post.

Anyway–the year is already almost two thirds of the way done, and there’s plenty of work to be done in that last third, so I’d best get to it. More news to follow soon!

 

Klohund training

This is the tip bowl we keep on our bathroom counter.

Who needs a tip bowl in the bathroom, you may wonder, and why is it filled with cereal?

Well, imagine you have a dachshund who is scared of the shower, and getting her bathed is always a stressful endeavor for both parties. One day, you get the brilliant idea to desensitize her to the unpleasant environment, so she’ll start associating the shower with positive things and stop being anxious about her baths. And because she’s a dachshund, the logical positive reinforcement is food. You keep some cereal in the bathroom and occasionally throw a few pieces into the empty shower stall when she’s around so she can go in there and get a free snack.

Now imagine you’re so successful that the whole approach backfires, and the dachshund gets so used to the routine that she follows you into the bathroom every time to collect her “tip”.

In the public bathrooms in Germany, they usually have a (generally female) bathroom attendant out front who has a little plate on a table for a small customary tip. Colloquially, they’re known as “Klofrau”. Well, we managed to train ourselves a Klohund.

On the plus side, she’s much better with baths now.

(The cereal is a high-protein, grain- and sugar-free alternative, not grocery store sugar bombs, in case you’re wondering about the health aspect, and she only ever gets two or three little pieces at a time.)

DESCENT is out today!

 

Today is the release day for DESCENT, the fourth installment of the Palladium Wars!

If you already preordered it, you should either have the paperback in your mailbox, or the ebook magically appeared on your Kindle this morning. For those who haven’t preordered, it’s available in paperback, Kindle, and Audible formats. (No hardcover this time, sorry.)

The jacket copy:

“POW Aden Jansen has lost a decade of his life to both the war and internment when he’s recruited by the Alliance. He’s to return to Gretia as an undercover Blackguard operative and destroy Odin’s Wolves—an insurgency that’s setting his home world afire. The mission comes with a full pardon and a chance to reclaim his identity. It also means rejoining his friends and family in space. That’s motive enough. If he can succeed—and survive.

Dunstan Park is on piracy patrol to track down the spaceborne arm of the uprising. Meanwhile, the rebels’ insidious terrorist cells are targets for battle-hardened insurgent hunter Idina Chaudhary and her Palladian commandos. As for Aden’s sister, Solveig, she’s put herself in the line of fire before, but discovering who’s bankrolling Odin’s Wolves is as dangerous as it is personal.

As Aden works his way back into the confidence of his comrades, the stealth campaign to sow discontent descends into chaos. At risk: Aden’s legacy, and the very stability of a galaxy struggling for peace against all odds.”

That sums it up in broad strokes, so if you’ve read the first three installments and this sort of thing floats your boat, get your copy today!

For those who asked about the projected length of the series–there will be at least one more installment, hopefully in the first half of next year.