Hey everyone!

PANIC! SHEER AND UTTER PANIC!

IN MUPPETY EXAGGERATION!

IN "DINOSAURS ARE COMING TO EAT US" PROPORTIONS!

And so on...

And so on...

Almost done...

Little more muppety...

A little bit Weasley...

Just a little bit spongy...

Last one. This one is actually more my style.

Chapters 4 & 5 have been added to the Inkshares page for The Children of the Forest. Looking ahead, I still have 3 more chapters to post, and I will try to have all 3 up by the end of the month. 

I've made some updates to my second book's page for The Darkest Places. The novel is equal parts science-fiction and horror, and the story combines elements of Boardwalk Empire, Indiana Jones, and H.P. Lovecraft. If you're a fan of the supernatural, any of the sources above, or my writing in general, go check it out @ https://www.inkshares.com/projects/the-darkest-places   and pre-order a copy today to help me win the Sword & Laser Contest (Part Deux).

Also, I've made the announcement before but I would like to remind all you savvy reader-folk that I am currently underway in holding a raffle for purchases of my books. Each sale of The Darkest Places & The Children of the Forest nets you a chance to win a $250.00 Amazon gift-card! 

The drawing will be held on December 10th, with a live video posted to youtube. So remember everyone, mark your calendars and be prepared for the inevitable horror of my terrible visage staring back and talking to you through your computer, while also announcing the winner.

~ Until next time! 

If someone offered you a $100 bill or the chance to keep everything you might find on a sunken treasure hunt, which would you choose?

ENHANCED finished 12th out of 335 in the Nerdist/Inkshares Contest, and we celebrated that achievement knowing we did so well because of you. Because our families and friends have generous spirits and a staunch belief in us and our book. Because total strangers -- many of them authors on Inkshares -- saw something worthwhile in our story and our writing.

Thanks to the author-friendly mission the Inkshares team promotes, we've even earned the right to Quill publication. We could put at least 315 copies of ENHANCED in our supporters' hands. On demand. Under a non-exclusive rights agreement.

Sounds like a golden opportunity, right?

But our favorite agent in the publishing industry informed us, "If the book is under contract with anyone, the agent will not represent it, unless it's self-published and selling really well."

So we had to choose between the $100 bill and the sunken treasure hunt.

What's life without risk and uncertainty? We're grabbing our scuba gear and heading for the Caribbean.

Three things before we go:

1. ENHANCED is currently being evaluated for its adaptability to film and television in the Book Pipeline Competition. The best part is that you don't have to do anything. But we hope you'll wish us well and follow our progress on Facebook  and Twitter.

2. Please support these worthwhile projects from the Nerdist/Inkshares Contest:

Single Version by Scott Barsotti -- so much more than just an extremely well-written Roach Punk story with an utterly original take and style.

Disintegration by Steve Soldwedel -- gritty and cinematic, diverse and multi-layered, with tyrannical aliens, never-say-die warriors, and spaceships. It's like old school scifi, but better. 

Ghosts of War by Paul Robinson -- fast-paced action + memorable characters + classic scifi dialog with a twist of now = an exciting story.

Presenting Complaints by Jamie Brindle -- a laugh-out-loud skewering of England's National Health Service, which Jamie just released on Amazon, iBooks, and Smashwords.

Current by Thomas A. Fowler -- reminiscent of Michael Crichton’s work, it promises tense adventure/mystery based on environmental progress. Fowler is currently querying agents.

And maybe most important,

3. Thank you, Inkshares for the possibilities you offer and the lessons you provide about marketing, competing with class, and how to persevere. Your entire team is a bright light showing aspiring authors hope and how to make it real. Special thanks to Avalon. What would we have done without you? You're warm, patient, knowledgeable, and encouraging -- the best kind of human being. We'll keep coming back to our Inkshares family to discover new authors and new favorite books. And who knows? Maybe we'll present something new of our own right here to see how the world feels about it.

Hello dear readers,

It’s been a little while. I try not to be too much of a bother and besides, we’ve just come through another NaNoWriMo and I’m glad to say that I’ve pulled through and met my word count.

This NaNoWriMo was different

Indeed, this time around I didn’t just set out to write a 50, 000 word novel in thirty days. Instead, I’ve embarked on a lifestyle. NaNoWriMo isn’t just a one month each year event any longer. Rather, it’s an every day thing. Without fail, I will write 1666 words each day unless I’m actively editing a book at the time. But this is boring to you. I’m boring. Let me talk about exciting things.

The Life Engineered is drawing close

We are less than three months away from the release of The Life Engineered and we’re starting the first few steps of the marketing campaign. Obviously, a lot of what’s going on is rather hush-hush, but I’m excited to say that the work Inkshares is doing on that front is incredible. It kills me that I can’t share more details with you but consider yourself teased.

The Sword & Laser Collection Contest : The Sequel

Very excited to announce that Sword & Laser is running another contest for their Collection. You might remember that collection where The Life Engineered makes its home. I am not participating in this contest. I have significantly too much on my plate right now that I can’t see myself pushing a book on top of everything. I highly encourage you to go check out the contestants though. Already a few of the new books participating look very promising and the selection promises to get better with every week.

My friend Andre is participating with his book Lies and Deception. Check it out and if you have spare credits toss them his way.

While I’m not in the contest I am still trying to get A God in the Shed funded to the 750 pre-order level. I’ll be powering up the promotion engines to push that project forward in the next few weeks but in the meantime, if you know anyone who’d be interested in a cool Fantasy/Horror book and helping an aspiring author, send them this link and tell them to pre-order A God in the Shed today.

As always, thank you for your support. It’s changing my life in ways I can’t begin to describe yet.

Cheers,

 JF

I hope you're happy. I'm happy.

SINGLE VERSION hit 500 readers in this last week of funding. 500 readers. That really floors me. It's looking like I'm probably not going to hit 750 copies, I really thought that I would and I could but I kinda hit a plateau. But that's ok, truly. It's hard to sell things. And 616 copies to 500 readers feels pretty great.

500. 500 people bought my book. I really can't thank you all enough.

Maybe, just maybe, there will be a mad surge in these last two days. Maybe everyone who's following the project--but has not yet bought a copy--will buy two copies (that would nearly get me there, actually!)....honestly, though, if you've been following SINGLE VERSION but have not yet bought yourself a copy, I hope you'll jump in here at the end.

This whole Inkshares experience has been thrilling, maddening, wonderful, frustrating, inspiring. And fun. It's really been a lot of fun. I'm humbled by the support you've all shown for the book, and I'm so excited to bring it to you. Now the pressure's on to make the book as good as it can be in the editing process.

And I'll really try to be better about updates in the coming months. I've been out of commission.

Tonight, I sleep. Tomorrow, I write! (Oh, actually, my brother's coming to town.) Sunday, I write!!!

- Scott

I wrote this post on my blog for the Nerdist Contest - but it still very much applies for SON OF SWORD & LASER CONTEST that just rumbled up from the ether this week. I hope this is helpful to all you bright,shiny new campaigns!

I raise my creaking bones from the sharp-edged divan of Anxiety and Editing to applaud and salute all the new campaigns! More writers, more books, more readers – these are always good things. It’s easy to think of writing as a purely competitive enterprise – especially in a contest framework, but you know what’s great about readers? They don’t want to read just one book – they want to read many books! And bringing more attention to my publisher helps me too – *rubs together hands maniacally* – now more people have a chance to see MY STUPID DORK BOOK FOR DORKS.

But let’s talk about your stupid dork book for dorks. And more importantly about how you can survive the next few weeks of the contest with crying in the bathtub only every other night.

1. Use your campaign dashboard. Inkshares gives you plenty of easy tools to link up all of your Facebook, Google, etc. contacts and puts them in a handy list called the Reader Pipeline. This is a perfect way to start keeping track of who you  have contacted, who’s pre-ordered the book, who you need to beg harder. There are also built-in tools to contact prospective readers and also to THANK people who bought your book.
2. Get comfortable with asking people for money. Yes, I know. It’s terrible. But you have to do it. All of the easy/passive ways you can ask aren’t going to get you there – i.e. posting on Facebook, or your blog, or Twitter. You are the best salesman of your work – you need to go directly to your friends, family, acquaintances, vague strangers, lemurs and ASK for the pre-order.
3. Take a long look at your writing schedule. Assume it’s going to get thrown away for most of the contest. It’s a stressful time! You are going to start refreshing the contest page a few times an hour in the last few days of the contest – go ahead and accept that your writer-brain has checked out, and you are pure rodent-lust. It can be extremely demoralizing for writers – as surprise! – writing is what keeps us happy and reasonably emotionally balanced. You need to account for that, and build in some slack in your support network. (see: crying in the tub.)
4. Get to know the other competitors. Not just follow their campaigns from the shadows — talk to them! 5 winners are going to make it, but there’s nothing saying that even more can hit the overall Inkshares funding goal. The more you share resources, readers, knowledge, and support the easier things will be for all of you. I made several friends during the last contest and I’m very glad that they are still talking to me. .
5. Noblesse oblige. No doubt, tensions are going to run high as the contest heats up – it pays to remember that you all have the same goal, the same dream. Go out of your way to play fair, to help out the other campaigns. We’re all a bunch of small-timers trying to take the leap into a bigger arena. Even if you win, you can still stumble. Nerds must be held to a higher moral code – we are all taught by the finest stories and the greatest heroes.
6. Updates. When you send out updates to your backers – remember that they are your allies, your friends and boon companions that want to help you make your dream come true. They are not your servants or conscripts. Ask them to help you, give them clear instructions of things they can do to aid the campaign – but don’t forget to entertain them! Show them exclusive parts of the book, concept art, videos, terrible pictures of yourself. Don’t just send out endless ‘GET MO PREORDERS’ updates – if you cause your core audience to tune you out, that’s hard to come back from!
7. Cry in the shower. There are going to come moments when you will wonder why you jumped into this thing. We make stuff, we write stuff – it’s a learned skill to put your work out there in the world where anyone can bang on it, or worse ignore it. This contest is 6 weeks of permanent vulnerability – it will be hard. And it’s okay to feel bad. Here’s another post I wrote all about the emotional damage of self-promotion.
8. It is okay to ask people for money. I’m saying this twice, because it goes against the grain for so many people. My day job is sales, so I have a much thicker skin about it – but even I get squirmy when it’s for my nerd poems. People want to help you – don’t feel like you have to make them read your excerpt, or explain the whole book to them. Don’t sell the book – sell YOU. Look in their eyes and ask for the preorder. This contest is purely based on unique readers – not preorder count, so you don’t have to stress about getting multiple books out of people. Just ask – I promise that it is okay.
9. Take breaks. Seriously – as much as you can, especially those last two weeks. You are going to become an internet-octopus, dripping your tentacles across all platforms looking for information and preorders and mentions and ideas and any glimmer of aid that can come to your campaign.  Go on walks. Play video games. Write if you can. There will come moments where you will stare at the contest page and try to WILL the numbers to go up – these are normal, but get your support network to pull you away from it as much as they can.
10. Contact Inkshares with questions or concerns. Some weird stuff happened last contest. A glitch with some referral credit, things not appearing properly on campaign pages, etc. Everyone at Inkshares was always quick to respond, eager to fix the problem, and as transparent as they could be about the source of the problem and the solution. They want to get it right and they work hard to do so – it’s why I’m quite glad to have them as my publisher. (HEARTS 4 INKS)
11. Cry in the shower.
12. Your book is not on trial. There are a lot of moving parts to this contest. People are going to pre-order your book because it sounds awesome. Or because you asked them. Or because they liked the cover. Or, or or…if you find yourself slipping down the ranks, it DOES NOT MEAN your book is bad. Maybe the other books are doing a better job of pestering people, or they have a bigger family, or, or or. Do not start beating up your book and blaming it for not being shiny enough. Unless your book is into that and has given clear, vigorous consent.
13. You can do it. By that I mean – you can get your book out into the world. This contest, the next contest, regular funding through Inkshares, Kickstarter, self-publishing, finding an agent, printing it out on copy paper and hiding it in Waffle House bathrooms — you can do it.

Enough blathering from me! Good fortune and good campaigning. If you have questions about anything, drop a comment below or look me up on Twitter – @gderekadams.