PopCon etc
* San Antonio PopCon is this Saturday, February 29th: https://guides.mysapl.org/sapopcon
This is a free event, at the San Antonio Central Public Library on Soledad. There will be costumes, lots of stuff for kids, anime, funko pop, books for sale, panels and gaming, etc. If you've never been to a library comic con event, they're a lot of fun.
I'll be there, along with Charlaine Harris, Christopher Golden, Ilona Andrews, Grace Draven,
David Liss and artists Jeffrey Alan Love, Justin Chase Black, Chris "Coop" Cooper, Kiri Ostegaard Leonard, John Picacio, and Babs Webb. Most of us will be at tables and you can wander around and talk to use and get books signed.
* False Value, the new Ben Aaronovitch Rivers of London book is out and I have already read it. This is one of my favorite series ever. Also reading Jade War by Fonda Lee. I need to get started back with my book rec posts again.
* Next week will be my chapter of Machina, yay! https://www.serialbox.com/serials/machina ETA: No, it's the week after next. I forgot the original first chapter was too long and got split in two.
* Joanne Harris has a great thread here about writers and anxiety: https://twitter.com/Joannechocolat/status/1232998538180808705
* https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/27/a-dirty-secret-you-can-only-be-a-writer-if-you-can-afford-it A dirty secret: you can only be a writer if you can afford it
According to a 2018 Author’s Guild Study the median income of all published authors for all writing related activity was $6,080 in 2017, down from $10,500 in 2009; while the median income for all published authors based solely on book-related activities went from $3,900 to $3,100, down 21%. Roughly 25% of authors earned $0 in income in 2017.
I would argue that there is nothing more sustaining to long-term creative work than time and space – these things cost money – and the fact that some people have access to it for reasons that are often outside of their control continues to create an ecosystem in which the tenor of the voices that we hear from most often remains similar. It is no wonder, I say often to students, that so much of the canon is about rich white people. Who else, after all, has the time and space to finish a book. Who else, after all, as the book is coming out, has the time and space and money to promote and publicize that book?
I'm not sure this is that much of a secret in genre writing as opposed to mainstream. The writers I knew when I first started out were open about having other jobs. Some of the first advice I read for starting a writing career was to buy a lot of canned food so you'd have something to eat between advances. And that was back when the economy was better, and before piracy was such a huge problem.
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This is a free event, at the San Antonio Central Public Library on Soledad. There will be costumes, lots of stuff for kids, anime, funko pop, books for sale, panels and gaming, etc. If you've never been to a library comic con event, they're a lot of fun.
I'll be there, along with Charlaine Harris, Christopher Golden, Ilona Andrews, Grace Draven,
David Liss and artists Jeffrey Alan Love, Justin Chase Black, Chris "Coop" Cooper, Kiri Ostegaard Leonard, John Picacio, and Babs Webb. Most of us will be at tables and you can wander around and talk to use and get books signed.
* False Value, the new Ben Aaronovitch Rivers of London book is out and I have already read it. This is one of my favorite series ever. Also reading Jade War by Fonda Lee. I need to get started back with my book rec posts again.
* Next week will be my chapter of Machina, yay! https://www.serialbox.com/serials/machina ETA: No, it's the week after next. I forgot the original first chapter was too long and got split in two.
* Joanne Harris has a great thread here about writers and anxiety: https://twitter.com/Joannechocolat/status/1232998538180808705
* https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/27/a-dirty-secret-you-can-only-be-a-writer-if-you-can-afford-it A dirty secret: you can only be a writer if you can afford it
According to a 2018 Author’s Guild Study the median income of all published authors for all writing related activity was $6,080 in 2017, down from $10,500 in 2009; while the median income for all published authors based solely on book-related activities went from $3,900 to $3,100, down 21%. Roughly 25% of authors earned $0 in income in 2017.
I would argue that there is nothing more sustaining to long-term creative work than time and space – these things cost money – and the fact that some people have access to it for reasons that are often outside of their control continues to create an ecosystem in which the tenor of the voices that we hear from most often remains similar. It is no wonder, I say often to students, that so much of the canon is about rich white people. Who else, after all, has the time and space to finish a book. Who else, after all, as the book is coming out, has the time and space and money to promote and publicize that book?
I'm not sure this is that much of a secret in genre writing as opposed to mainstream. The writers I knew when I first started out were open about having other jobs. Some of the first advice I read for starting a writing career was to buy a lot of canned food so you'd have something to eat between advances. And that was back when the economy was better, and before piracy was such a huge problem.
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