Ah, the moment we’ve all be waiting for!! Here is the real book!!
Okay, now that I’m done sobbing, let’s get to the thank you’s. Can’t tell everybody how amazing this is, and now I will try to express most sincere thanks as well as humanly possible.
So here goes. First, though, a short background of how this long, strange trip began. Women Like Us had a go-around with publishers when my TV/Movie agent at the time gave the manuscript to a book agent in NY. She loved it, and was just certain -- really one hundred percent certain! -- she was going to sell it. So out it went to a big bunch of publishers and while it came close in a couple of instances, the agent turned out to be wrong! Imagine that. Anyway, I ended up doing some revisions, had a parting of the ways with said agent and then was on the verge of a go-around looking for new representation when I read about inkshares in a piece on Deadline about its deal with UTA. Right around that time, an old friend was visiting, just as I was debating whether or not to give Inkshares a try. I gave her three chapters and was curious to see the reaction -- would she want to read more? Or not? Well, she did, and it pretty much inspired me to give this a try, and so first let me thank Kate Funk for the encouragement to just go for it and launch the campaign to get the book published. Also, I need to thank everybody who jumped on board in the pre-order phase. This wouldn’t have happened without you and I can’t express enough my appreciation.
Now let’s talk about the book itself. Marcia Parlow’s cover -- front back and spine -- is just beautiful, and I can’t thank her enough for all the hard work that went into getting it done. Thanks also to Claudia Domenig for the picture that became the cover, and thanks to Steven Murashige for making me look somewhat decent in my author photo! Thanks also to my two wonderful blurb providers, the hugely talented and generous authors Charles Dickinson and Joseph Asphahani. Meanwhile at Inkshares, can I say a word about Angela Melamud? Can I say more than one word? Angela has been so patient and kind and helpful through this entire process. She answers numerous questions (sometimes daily, sometimes stupid) with what always feels like a smile. I can’t thank Angela enough through all the editing and production. And Matt at Inkshares for the marketing advice, and Adam for legal (although Adam did make me take out the recipes section!). Over at Girl Friday Productions, the folks that did the nuts and bolts of putting the book together, thank you to first Bethany Davis and then Jaye Whitney Debber. Both of them, like Angela, have the patience of saints!! To all the other Inkshares authors who have provided support, I thank you all most sincerely too -- you guys are amazing and just to name a few: Amanda Orneck, Matt Sobin, Landon Crutcher, Billy O’Keefe, Joni Dital, Tony Valdez, Ricardo Henriquez, Peter Ryan and more!! If you haven’t checked out their books, do it!
So I’m going to get started signing books. Soon they’ll be in your hands, and if you’ve already dipped into an eBook I hope you’re loving it. One last request to everybody: as many of you know customer reviews are critical on Amazon so I’m providing the link to the Amazon Page. If you’ll scroll down to the ’write a customer review’ section’ and give it some stars and maybe a line or two, I’d so appreciated it. And it hopefully will get the book into even more hands. So that’s it for now. Again, many, many thanks.
Here’s that Amazon link:
My dear Animals,
After this update I’m out. Radio Silent. Taking a Hike. You could say I’m ‘Going Astray.’ (Alluding to Animal in Man’s first chapter.) You won’t get another update from me until my manuscript is done, I swear it. And in this final update before its arrival, I’m pleased to report that the writing is progressing faster now than ever before. But enough about my own work. I wanted to shine a brighter light on three sci-fi novels that have totally got me on their hooks this week.
Lady Timekeeper: Cities in the Dust is co-authored by two very dear friends of mine, Marie Green and MK McFadden, who I’ve known for almost three years now. We grew up on criticizing each others’ work in Full Sail University’s Creative Writing Master’s program, so I can tell you truly: there are no other authors I know better ‘round here than them, and their work is worth your attention. Writing about time-travel can be extremely difficult (I know, I’ve tried), but Marie and MK manage to weave two of the most important story elements into the complexities of the concept: ACTION and SUSPENSE. Go follow Lady Timekeeper right now!
For the second spotlighted book… A quick story, if I may: so the other day I was in the forums dropping my two cents about comment etiquette, when an unfamiliar name came up as a notification. “Kaytalin Platt liked your…” etc. etc. So I checked in on her, and lo and behold found this amazing story she’s putting together, “The Living God.” Right now, as I type this, there are simply NOT ENOUGH FOLLOWERS on that draft. It’s another story about time travel (I’m sensing a theme here!), but it’s set in an epic fantasy world. It’s like Jeremy McGuire (or whoever) said in his movie, “You had me at ‘Time Mage.’” Please go follow Kaytalin’s draft.
Another quick[er] story: I got an email yesterday informing me that Brien Shores’ novel “I Think You Dropped This” has returned to Inkshares for a renewed funding campaign. What sort of world do we live in where writing this good can’t make its funding goal? Perhaps a world where people who are reading this aren’t clicking this link to check out Brien’s amazing book. I don’t want to live in a world like that. The mouse is in your hand, as is the power, to make that ardent wish a reality. ...OK, ok, enough with the meta… The bottom line is, Brien’s storytelling is a mind-f**king good time. You will be pleasantly puzzled one moment, and laughing out loud the next. Go check out “I Think You Dropped This.”
(One last look at the breathtaking artwork for The Animal in Man, shall we? Credit to artist Ilie Vaduva.)
Peace out, you Animals. No more updates from me until the big one hits, but if you ever want to get a hold of me, I’m a DM or a tweet away.
Hello guys, gals, robots,
I figured I might as well keep you guys a little updated as thanks for following this project.
I’m a little behind schedule getting the Draft version of the campaign ready. Mostly because it entails having images and a video and a bunch of things ready to launch and I want to get this right.
On the bright side, the first draft worthy of being sent to beta readers is almost ready and I’m very excited about it. I had a blast writing it so I’m tentatively optimistic you’ll enjoy reading it.
As a ’treat’ for you who are early into this project, here are some sketches of the main characters’ heads in Arch Android.
I’m mostly trying to be a better feel of how I want them to look so I can make a temporary cover. I’m still planning on getting the amazing Eric Belisle to do his interpretation of whatever I come up with for the final cover. Hopefully I can convince him to do that.
Thanks for your support. Let’s get more people on board so that when this project launches it gets funded so fast I won’t even have time to get an ulcer (this time).
Cheers,
JF
I’ve been writing since 6 a.m. I’m looking forward to delivering the manuscript to my five beta readers in just a few days. It feels good to be moving with some real momentum.
I know you get a lot of email, Inkshares-related and otherwise, and it’s probably difficult to keep track of the myriad projects you’ve followed, especially one like mine where the updates are seldom but ... if you can muster some of that attention for which there are a million different stimuli vying, and give some of it here ... it would be an immense help for you to spread the word that Disintegration is ... ahem ... coming together ( :P ) nicely and that it’s worth ordering.
We’ve been hovering just over 400 orders for a while. It’d be really welcome to break that mark and start making progress again. If you’ve ordered already, please take your belief in my book and encourage at least one other person to order a copy for themselves.
If you haven’t ordered, send me a Direct Message and let me know what else you need to be enticed.
All right, now it’s time for a nice, big, second breakfast (ham, eggs and cheese on tortillas with arugula and hot sauce, a cup of tea, some yogurt ... I wish I had some toast and cherry preserves, but I don’t) and then ... more writing!
Whew. Everyday life is still taking up most of my time. Mainly it’s my job and the weird schedule, which leaves me scrambling to catch up on my days off. Well, another thing is also just me having too many projects going at once, so that part of it is my own fault. ;)
I’ll hopefully have the next chapter of Uncharted Territory finished soon(ish). I managed to get a few other things accomplished in the meantime.
One is another video in my Mass Effect Writing Discussion series on YouTube. Another is Chapter 30 of Freelancers, titled "Winds of Change." It’s posted on Fanfiction.net, Archive of our Own, and FanStory.
The last bit of business for tonight is actually related to Uncharted Territory, and is also just really, really cool. A bit of inspiration hit while I was having my morning coffee and trying to finish waking up. I’ve been using Big Stock Photo for the images I use for my book covers. Didn’t cost anything to sign up, and when I joined they were running an offer that lets me download one free image per month. I keep getting sidetracked and forgetting to sign back in and grab a free image, but occasionally I remember. :P
I generally look for starscapes or alien planets or cities/landscapes, etc., that I can place text over for the book titles and whatnot. Suddenly remembered the site existed this morning, planned to download one of the alien-planet pictures I’d saved to my shopping list, when I stumbled onto this image.
I took one look at it and an idea for a whole new character popped into my head. I’ll be adding her to Uncharted Territory and sometime later on making her the central character in another book (and the above image will be one of the elements in the cover art, laid over a background image). Which is pretty much how Kolya Mason started off and ended up in Uncharted Territory. Sometimes all it takes is a single image to enter my line of sight and bam! -- a whole new character comes together in my head in a matter of minutes. I love it when that happens.
I decided to name her Vacendak. Heh ... Freejack wasn’t the best movie I’ve ever seen, but it had a lot of fun moments, and for some reason that name stuck in my head for all these years. It just seemed to fit this picture and the ideas I had for this new character.
You’ll be seeing more of her soon, starting with an upcoming chapter of Uncharted Territory ....
Greetings fellow Pirates!!
Its been a while, I know. I’ve been working in overdrive at night to make sure I can get my manuscript into Inkshares’ hands by my self-imposed deadline of next month. They are so chill though, they really don’t give deadlines, just support. This is a wonderful platform, and I’m grateful to be member of it.
BUT I have something so amazing to show you. Last month I decided I wanted a change, and thought a new cover would be a good idea. I enlisted a talented artist, Elizabeth Rupp, to design the book’s new cover. What do you think?
I think it looks amazing! Thank you Elizabeth!
So you ask, what does a dragon have to do with dinosaur paleontology? Pre-order The Pirates of Montana to find out!
No need for a fun dinosaur meme on this update. The Dragon Lizard will rise again!
Excelsior,
Erin
Hey everyone. I just want to say THANK YOU again for pushing us past the 100 mark last weekend. It’s so humbling to have this much support, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it. As promised, I’m handing out the first three chapters of BLUE WATER. But I thought instead of just sending them along in an email that you have to print out and read, I’d do something else to make it a little easier. (Hopefully.)
At the bottom of this document is a link to our website. There, you’ll find a link to three different versions of the beginning of BLUE WATER, so that you can read it on your screen of choice, be it a computer, an iPad or iPhone, or a Kindle.
The PDF will be the simplest. If you want, you could just download that and print it, or read if from your screen. PDF is pretty versatile, and can usually be read anywhere.
The ePub and MOBI file are your expert (cooler) mode ways to read. I’ve tested both out, and they both work fine.
THE DIRECT LINK TO DOWNLOAD THE FIRST THREE CHAPTERS IS HERE:
http://www.bluewaternovel.com/#!read-it/ekdqn
To download the PDF from a PC/Mac:
1.) Click the link below.
2.) Right click on "PDF"
3.) Click "Save Link As..." and save the file where ever you like.
To read on Kindle:
1.) From the Kindle, click the link below, (or open Silk and go to bluewaternovel.com and click the link "Read the FIRST THREE CHAPTERS")
2.) Click "KINDLE (.mobi). The file should download immediately.
3,) After the download is finished, click "Open."
To read on iPad/iPhone:
1.) From the iPad, click the link below, (or go to bluewaternovel.com and click the link "Read the FIRST THREE CHAPTERS")
2.) Click "eReader(.ePub)"
3.) Click "Download" in the bottom right
4.) After the file completes downloading, the "download" button changes to "OPEN IN..." Click that.
5.) Choose "Copy to iBooks"
If anyone has any trouble, please do not hesitate to let me know, either by private message on Facebook, or emailing me at bluewaternovel@gmail.com
Thank you again for all your belief in this book. With any crowdfunding campaign, the worst fear ever is no one else shows up. You guys have answered the call in droves.
If you haven’t preordered Blue Water yet, maybe these three chapters will be enough to sway your opinion. There’s 32 more where this came from. If you want to know what happens next, we have to get to at the very least 250 to achieve a light publication goal. The good news is, three weeks in, we’re just shy of halfway there. So PREORDER TODAY, and TELL YOUR FRIENDS. Spread the word, share the chapters link with anyone you think might be into the book, and let them get a taste. The only way anyone reads more is if we cross the finish line. Together, we can finish this campaign, and finish this story.
Thank you all again. Keep up the good work,
Joseph Parcell