Sean Patrick Little's Blog: Still in Wisco, page 14

Today is the Day!

Today...
Today is the day that LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS is officially released. It is my eighth full novel. It's strange to think that I will have two more coming out in the next 12 months. Busy guy, I am.

I didn't sleep well. I have a bit of a lingering cough that annoys me, but mostly I didn't sleep because of what I call "new class" energy. Anytime I'm going to get to speak in front of people for the first time, I tend not to sleep well. Whether it was before the first day of a new semester when I was teaching, or before I was going to present or speak at a conference or panel, I have never slept well the night before such an event. Most of that gets attributed to the whole "fear of the unknown" thing. Part of me is laid-back and goes with the flow. The other part of me is a massive control freak who wants to know how everything is going to lay out before I get somewhere. These two halves are at constant war in my brain. It's hectic in my head.

I have been seeing a bunch of pictures from TeslaCon in my newsfeed of Facebook. It looks amazing. Despite having known Eric since the first year of TeslaCon, and despite having written scripts and other things for it over the years, I have never attended. I am excited to show up and participate. My friend, Carol Kaufman, asked me if I was going to be putting on my goggled top hat and spats. I don't think so...I'm not one for dressing up. I loathe occasions where I have to wear a tie. Those that know me know that I really only have two looks: jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, or jeans and a button-down plaid shirt. I'm not what you'd call a Fashion Icon. My biggest choice for today is whether I'm going sweatshirt or button-down. If I go button-down, I might get wild and add a jacket--but that's about it. In a perfect world, I'd never put on a suit or tie again.

I'm nervous and excited to see people's reactions to the book. I've gotten a few pieces of feedback from beta-readers, and my friend, Maddy Hunter, sent me a lovely email last night about how much she was enjoying it. When you spend a year and change with something bouncing around in your brain, you want people to like it.

I haven't really decided anything about what I'm going to say at the panel. I figured I'd do some sort of half-assed introduction to it, and then sort of talk about the origins. If people have questions, so be it. I only get an hour, and I want to be around to sign books for people, so I have to be brief. Anyone who has had to sit through one of my English classes knows that I can be effusive.

In honor of the book's release, here's some tidbits about it:

--The hero's name, Nicodemus Clarke, is clearly a subliminal reference to Indiana Jones. Nic-o-DE-mus. In-DI-an-a. Four syllables each, plus a single syllable surname, plus the accent on the "DE" sound in each. That was done on purpose. (I think for every nerd boy like myself in my generation, Harrison Ford is, and will forever be, the man.) I also wanted a surname that sounded like a first name, since I would be referring to the characters by surnames so much in the book. Also, Nicodemus is one of my favorite character names. Anyone who has read MRS. FRISBY AND THE RATS OF NIMH knows what I'm saying.

--This book is easily the funniest book I've ever written. I'm not going to say it's a laugh-a-minute riot, but it has a few good lines. For those who know the Lord Bobbins character, it will have an extra level of humor because they know how he talks and presents himself, but I tried to convey as much as Bobbins as I could through the prose.

--Bobbins' airship, ENDEAVOUR, is a reference to one of my favorite mystery writers, Colin Dexter. Dexter wrote the Inspector Morse mysteries. In the eighth Morse novel, THE WENCH IS DEAD, Dexter finally revealed Morse's first name, Endeavour. Prior to that, when someone asked Morse for his first name, he would dourly reply, "Inspector."

--I had to research Romanian words for this book. The named Romanian characters have authentic Romanian names. Romania is a cool country, and it wouldn't have served to have Romanians with names like Dave and Keith. The castle Bobbins inherits in the book has a Romanian translation. Roughly, it translates to "Castle of the Black Crow."

--The story is based on a story I tried to write twice before for TeslaCon, back when I was still trying to use Bobbins as the main character/audience vehicle. It didn't work because Bobbins needed to retain an air of mystery and distance from the reader. Perhaps after the Con, I'll post the prologue from that book to better explain the central story.

In about three hours, I'll be loading books into my van to haul to TeslaCon. I hope to meet everyone who preordered a copy and thank them personally. I want to get as many pictures of people in costume with the book. I better make sure my cell phone has a full battery.

I think I'll have a few copies of AFTER EVERYONE DIED available, as well.
For those without tickets, my part of the event starts at 1:30 in Maker 1 at the Madison Marriott West. I think they will let you sneak in just for that part of it, if you want to show up and say hello.

I'll be the big fat guy who looks like a nervous wreck.

Hope to see you there.

--Sean

The New Book is Live

I was worried that the book wasn't going to go live in time for the Con on retail sites, but it appears a small miracle has happened.
LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS is now up on all your favorite online retail sites.

However, I would rather see people email Joanne at Mystery to Me bookstore to get my books. Or go to your own local indie bookstore.

Online shopping is fun and easy, sure--but Jeff Bezos doesn't need your money. Keep it independent. Support people who run small bookstores. They will bend over backward to help you, and you can form a relationship with them. That's way better than anything Amazon will give you.

Email Joanne at Mystery to Me's website, or even on their Facebook page and order up a copy or seven from her. You can get autographed copies from her (also, something you can't get on Amazon), and you can even get them personalized, if you want. I'm happy to that.

I'll provide the Amazon link because it's important that people review the book there. It helps me immensely. Obviously, once the eBook goes live, Amazon and other online retailers will be the place to get it.
However, if you're going hard copy, please get it from Joanne or your local indie bookstore.

https://www.amazon.com/Lord-Bobbins-R...

https://www.mysterytomebooks.com/

--Sean

Seven Days

Seven Days...

In one week's time, LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS will debut at TeslaCon.

In the meantime, here's a list of things you can do until LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS releases:

1. Buy and read AFTER EVERYONE DIED
2. Tell someone to buy and read AFTER EVERYONE DIED
3. Write a review for AFTER EVERYONE DIED if you haven't already. Post it to Amazon, Goodreads, and your Facebook feeds.
4. Tell your local library to get AFTER EVERYONE DIED for you. Check it out. Keep it for a week. Return it. Tell them it was amazing.
5. Make up some AFTER EVERYONE DIED fan art. Post it on Pinterest. If someone asks what it is, instruct them to do steps 1-4 of this list.
6. Have you had Hy-Vee sushi? Surprisingly good.
7. Pre-order LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS.
8. Visit Teslacon and see what they're all about.
9. Google Steampunk. Click "Images." Check all that out! Damn, people be creative...
10. Did you read AFTER EVERYONE DIED on eBook? Did you know there are hard copies?
11. Go to Culver's in Sun Prairie. Order a double cheeseburger. Eat it. Experience joy.
12. Go buy Alex Bledsoe's Tufa books and read them. Amazing stuff. Seriously--one of my favorite book series. Absolutely magical. Literally. https://us.macmillan.com/thetufa…/ale...
13. Attend a costumed Halloween function as Rowdy from AFTER EVERYONE DIED.
14. Watch some Scrubs reruns on Hulu.
15. Visit my Twitter account and follow me there.
16. Go to Goodreads and follow me there if you haven't.
17. Anyone want to get some pizza?
18. Badgers play Illinois tomorrow at 11. I'll be on my couch. I can text you when the Badgers score.
19. True story: My mom once said, "Why don't you write books people will like?" MY MOM said that.
20. Bask in my gratitude. If you've made it to the end of this stupid list, I'm grateful. If you've bought one or more of my books, I'm grateful. If you've told others to buy/read one or more of my books, I'm eternally grateful.

I hope the new book lives up to expectations.

Halloween & TeslaCon

It's October, and that means Halloween. So, here's a few of my favorite Halloween-type things:

Scariest Movie: 'Red State.' For some reason, I'm just not scared by movies like 'The Exorcist' or 'The Conjuring.' To me, the sheer plausibility of Red State is the scarier than any head-spinning, pea soup-vomiting 'tween. It's not a prototypical scary movie, but I haven't seen anything that shook me more than that movie before or since, except maybe 'Red Dawn'--the original one, not the horrible remake. Between the Five Points cult and the ATF reminding us that state power will always win, Kevin Smith made a terrifying little gem of a movie that has stuck with me long after seeing it.

Scariest Book: None. I've never been scared by a book. I have read a handful of horror novels, and none of them have really freaked me out. If I had to pick something unsettling, it would probably be something with a serial killer in it--'Silence of the Lambs' or something similar. Just like it's rare for a book to make me laugh out loud, it's even rarer for a book to scare me.

Best Candy: Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. Love those things. I can't eat them anymore, but I loved those. Butterfingers were a close second.

Best Costume: Anything that is also a pun.

Best Halloween Reading: 'Haunted Wisconsin' by Beth Scott and Michael Norman. Still one of my favorite books.

Favorite Halloween Movie: The Disney version of 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.'

Worst Candy: The black-and-orange peanut butter taffy that some people give out.

Worst Costume: Anything pop culture-related made slutty for no reason just so college co-eds will wear it. Do we really need sexy Ninja Turtle costumes?
___________________________________________

Shortly after Halloween will be Teslacon.

Saturday, November 4 I will be at TeslaCon to deliver the pre-orders for the new book, LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS, and I think I've been allotted a small window of time in which to speak. After that, I'm contemplating doing an online/live chat on Facebook to further promote the book. My biggest fear about doing any sort of live online stream is that no one will show up, or if people do show up, no one will have any questions or anything to say, so basically it ends up being me on camera filling time until I decide to kill the feed.

The first book signing I ever did--not only did no one show up for it, but no one even talked to me. I sat at a table in the back corner of a Barnes & Noble for two hours and everyone avoided me like the plague. It was awful. Since then, I've attended a few cons and book festivals where something similar happened. I was invited to the very first Southwest Wisconsin Festival of Books a few years back and I didn't sell a single book. I sat at table and stared at the fluorescent lights for almost eight hours. It was worse than the signing at Barnes & Noble.

I'm uniquely bad at promoting my own stuff. I figure, it's out there, and people can read it if they want to. I'm not going to force them. Some people, they're very driven by promotion. They do it well. Some indie/self publishers have built a career on their ability to self-promote. I'm a bad salesman. I don't want to force anyone to read my stuff if they don't want to read it. I just throw it out into the ether and hope it finds an audience. I will most likely never find success this way, but I've made my piece with it. I don't chase agents or publishers. I just hope people will read them, and if they read them, I hope they will like them. Whatever happens from there, happens.

I haven't started the edits on THE LONG AND EMPTY ROAD, yet. I like to give books a clearing-out period in my brain before I try to go back through them. You really need to see them with new eyes and a new headspace before you can edit. In the meantime, I've still got a couple of books sitting on my computer that have been needing work for a long while, and I've been playing with a new idea that I initially thought of as Tarzan in Middle Earth, but I don't know if it's going to be good enough to carry through.

I've long wanted to write a ship & crew piece of sci-fi along the veins of Star Trek or Firefly, but everything I've tried in that realm has felt really played out. Ah, well--something will come to me someday, maybe.

I have emailed a few bookstores and libraries about getting something set up for promotion for the new book in November, but none have gotten back to me, so this new book may not do as well as I hoped. Still, LORD BOBBINS & THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS will be up on your favorite online retailers soon, and it will be in ebook form soon, as well.

Keep an eye out.

-Sean

Update on the Sequel to AFTER EVERYONE DIED, and other things

The sequel to AFTER EVERYONE DIED has rounded third and is cruising comfortably toward home plate. Given that I set out to give these books an atypical structure and voice, it's doesn't feel like it's ending to me. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. The first draft WILL be done before the end of October, though. That's far ahead of schedule for me.

Unemployment has at least helped my writing productivity. If I didn't have all the financial worries that unemployment brings, I'd be really good at not having a job. I'm getting a ton of writing done. Unprecedented productivity in my life, really. I've been writing since second grade, writing seriously since my Junior year of high school. I've worked at newspapers, taught composition at the high school and post-secondary level, and this summer, for the first time in my 42 years, I actually feel like I'm starting to know what I'm doing.

Ideally, once the first draft is done, I'll turn my attentions to other projects for a month or so before I set to editing it. Edits can take a couple of months, sometimes as long as six, depending on life and time. I will be sending the first draft to a couple of trusted beta-readers, too. Then, when I'm happy with the edits and the beta-reader feedback has been weighed and considered, I'll beg Paige Krogwold to design the cover (she graciously did the cover for AED for me). Then, it will go to press.

Best case scenario: March, 2018. More likely, it will be April or May, though. AFTER EVERYONE DIED came out in May of 2016, so that would be more fitting.

In another two weeks, LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS will debut at Teslacon on Nov. 4, I think. After that, there may be some sort of launch at Mystery to Me, and I'm trying to arrange other appearances at libraries or bookstores. The book is a steampunk adventure novel based around TeslaCon, a big steampunk convention held in Madison, Wis. every year, and the characters and world that Eric Jon Larson built for the convention. It's probably the funniest book I've written. It's hard for me to write funny. I think I've had too much grimdark influence. I enjoy reading humor (Christopher Moore, the late, great Prachett, etc...), but I find it hard to write it. This book has some good jokes and lines.

There will be a sequel to RomanianRuckus. The first draft is already complete. It will likely be titled LORD BOBBINS AND THE DOME OF LIGHT. It won't come out until TeslaCon 2018, though.

Okay, enough procrastination. I have to go finish writing a book.

Thoughts About Negative Reviews

I read a historical fiction novel this past week about Caroline Ingalls. Good book--the review is posted on my page. I was just reading other people's reviews for it, though. One woman gave it two stars out of five because she "didn't like the historical notes at the end."

Basically, the novel CAROLINE was based on actual historical record intermixed with the Laura Ingalls Wilder stories she'd recorded years ago. Some of the historical record and Laura's stories didn't gel.

For instance, the historical records document that Laura's younger sister, Carrie, was born in the Kansas Territory. Laura originally included her as a baby in LITTLE HOUSE IN THE BIG WOODS because she didn't know if there was going to be sequel and she wanted to include her sister in the story.

The reviewer rambled on for about two paragraphs about how she didn't like the historical changes in the book "because it felt like an assault on everything I knew."

I don't know how to think about this. I hate the phrase "everyone's entitled to his or her opinion." This might be one of the dumbest things people use to justify horrible, uninformed opinions. It's something they use to deny facts and logic. You're entitled to your opinion over the taste of someone's cooking. You're entitled to your opinion over whether or not you liked a book or a piece of art. However, when it comes to reviewing a book, to downgrade the review because it challenged your preconceived, factually inaccurate view of the world--you're probably a bad human being.

I try not to read reviews for my own books. I never believe the good reviews, and I spend far too much time dwelling on the bad ones. I think that's pretty typical for a lot of writers. However, I enjoy reading intelligent reviews for other people's books, and I like to write reviews for books I really enjoyed. If I don't really enjoy a book, I won't write a review for it. I will never understand the need other people feel to trash out someone else's work. I get emails from people, "I read your book. I didn't like it." Well...gee. Thanks. What's an appropriate response to that? You sat down and read something you didn't like, so you decided you needed to ruin the writer's whole week (or in my case, ruin the next six or seven months of my life)? I get that people are very opinionated. That seems to be a societal constant. I know the anonymity of the internet allows people to feel empowered; they don't have to look a fellow human being in the eyes when they deliver their uninformed opinions. I just wonder if that woman, when writing her review and delivering a damning two-star review even stopped to consider why she was writing what she was writing.

You don't like a book, fine. That's your opinion. You don't like a book because it changes your understanding of a timeline of events? Maybe the problem isn't with the book, but with you.

A Sample of the New Book

I put up a small sample of the new book on my Facebook page, if you're interested in seeing some of it.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/sean-p...

Keyboards of Fire

I have my new book, LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS, coming out on November 4 at TeslaCon in Madison. I'm also working on setting up a book launch at Mystery to Me in Madison, Wis. and maybe some other bookstores around Wisconsin, too.

If you have a steampunk convention or a bookstore and would like to host me for an hour or two, let me know. I'm charming and funny in person. Honest.

Since getting the last book ready, I have had to luxury of spending 4-6 hours a day working on the sequel for the TeslaCon book. Called LORD BOBBINS AND THE DOME OF LIGHT, I had a story, an outline, and I was motivated to do more with the characters I had been working with over the past year. So, I absolutely jammed through the initial draft of this book. I cranked out the entire 68,000 word sequel in exactly 30 days. It's probably the fastest I've ever written a novel.

And, even though it's still on the first draft--I think it's really pretty good. It's a tight, fun story with some solid jokes.

In the meantime, I am in that horrible waiting period for the new book to be released. I'm highly worried about how it will be received. Given the fact that I'm playing in someone else's sandbox with the book, it feels like there is a lot that can go wrong. All I can do is hope that people will be happy with it.

Now that the two TeslaCon projects are out of the way, I've been able to turn my full attentions back to the sequel for AFTER EVERYONE DIED.

It's been good to get back to that book, but given the tone, the voice, and the perspective are entirely different than the TeslaCon books, it's been a little rough getting back into Twist's head. It feels good to be back to it, though. I still hope to have it see publication next Spring, but we'll see if that can actually happen. Fingers crossed.

In the meantime, please keep spreading the word of AFTER EVERYONE DIED, if you can. Tell friends. Post on social media. If you're creative, draw pictures or compose songs or make short videos--anything helps. Talk to your local library and ask them to get the book. Talk to your local bookstores and ask them to carry it. Everything helps.

I sincerely appreciate the emails and messages I've gotten from people about the sequel, and I'm very glad to be back working on it again.

We'll see you on THE LONG AND EMPTY ROAD next Spring.

The New Novel!

I'm excited to announce that my new book, LORD BOBBINS AND THE ROMANIAN RUCKUS, is available now for pre-order.

This novel is a grand steampunk adventure based on characters created for the wildly popular, immersive steampunk convention TeslaCon.

TeslaCon is held in Madison, Wisconsin every fall. Tickets are still available for this year's con, which happens the first weekend of November. check out the website (www.teslacon.com) for more information.

The link to pre-order a copy is below. If you are going to attend the Con, you can save $6 on the shipping and handling, as well as meet me and get the book signed. (I don't think that would be all too exciting, but hey--I like to meet new people.)

Click the link for a summary of the story.

https://www.facebook.com/commerce/pro...

The Madness to My Methods

I love articles about how writers actually write. The practicalities of it--where do they work? How do they work? What do they use to write? I like seeing their work spaces--or sometimes, the lack thereof. I like seeing who works longhand and who works on a computer or typewriter (apparently, some still do a first draft that way).

So, just for the fun of it, I'll cover some of what I do:

Hardware: I use a REALLY cheap laptop to do the majority of my writing, a lousy little Dell I picked up at Office Depot that cost less than $200. I don't use it for anything other than writing so I didn't need it to be fast or have amazing graphics. It's good for what it does. It can be frustratingly slow at times, but it's a good little machine. Long battery life, a good keyboard. That's all I need there. I don't often write longhand, but when I do I have a very nice hardcover notebook I use for just such a purpose. I have two pens I like to use: one is a cheap fountain pen (if you've never tried writing with a fountain pen, try it. They are nice!) and the other is a Cross ballpoint. Cross makes the best pens.

Software: I use a program called Scrivener to write now, though I'm very new to that (the novel coming out in November will the first one I wrote using Scrivener). It's a pretty solid little program meant solely for writing novels. I guess you can do screenplays on it, too--but Celtx is better for that. I used to use Google Docs for the majority of my writing, but I got a good deal on Scrivener and I really like it. I use Google Docs now for when I'm not around my laptop or home computer. I can log in and write what I need to, then copy-and-paste it to the main document in Scrivener.

Workspace: I have a very nice desk in the basement of my house. It's an old military surplus tin-side that weighs a ton. It's comfortable and smells ancient. I like it. It was in my house when we moved in. The former owners begged me to take it because it was too much of a pain in the ass to move it. I accepted. I only really work on layout on down there, though. And sometimes editing. I find my creativity and focus are both stifled when I try to work at home (there's always something to clean, or fix, or a pet that needs attention, or something on TV, or internet to dink around on), hence the laptop I can take on the road.

When I really want to sit down and write, I have to go someplace. When I lived in Rochester, Minn., there was a little table on the second floor that overlooked the street. I liked to work there. It was almost never in use when I went there. Now that I live in Sun Prairie, I will occasionally go to the SP library, but their chairs and tables aren't the most comfortable. I prefer working in a booth at Culver's in Sun Prairie. (I'm trying to get a sponsorship from them--if you know anyone in the franchise offices, let them know!) I also like working at the Arby's in Sun Prairie. They both have really comfortable booths and free wi-fi in case I need to look something up online.

I don't do coffee shops. I know that's the traditional work space for writers away from home. Every time I go into a coffee shop, I see someone hacking away on a word program. I don't care for the smell of coffee and the vibe in most coffee shops throws me off. Culver's or Arbys' is good enough.

When I do work at home, I either sit at my kitchen table (which makes me have to deal with two cats who think that they own the table for some reason, or I sit on my couch with a plastic lap desk (which makes my dog think it's belly-rub time). When I work at home, I don't listen to music anymore, either. I used to. Now, I put on reruns of a favorite sit-com that I've watched a billion times. I've seen it so often that I can ignore it, but it provides a comfortable background noise. It doesn't distract, but it's there to keep me company. SCRUBS, PARKS & RECREATION, and MASH are my favorites. Sometimes I will put on the Food Network. I can safely ignore that as well, but it's nice to occasionally look up and see a really tasty-looking burger.

Okay--that's enough of a distraction from real work for today. I'm going to plow ahead on a new novel for the next hour or two, and then go home for dinner. If anyone is interested, I can break down my actual writing process. It's probably not as exciting as me occupying a booth at Culver's, though.

As an addendum: There are 117 reviews of AFTER EVERYONE DIED on Amazon right now. I am very grateful for them. If you can, please tell your local library to get a copy or ask a local indie bookstore to carry it. Mystery to Me in Madison has hard copies, if you're interested.

With the completion of the editing process for the new book (which isn't a sequel to AED), I can go back to working on that sequel in earnest. Wish me luck.

--Sean

PS--If you write and want to volunteer your methods and locations, please do in the comments. I would love to read them.