Thursday
Dec202007
so... about that novel
Thursday, December 20, 2007 at 5:40PM
what can i say? life got in the way, and it wasn't meant for me to write a full length novel in the month of November. However, thanks to NaNoWriMo, I've got a great start with some great ideas and a few chapters to build off of. I will see this to completion, even if it's a few months away. At this point, I'm thinking I might even take a few days of vacation spattered here and there to work on it.
In doing things like this, I like to know what all the possibilities are. If I'm going to write this thing; poor my time, energy and ideas into a manuscript... then I want to make sure that there's at least a chance that someone will discover it and enjoy it. I've done some minimal research and found that, at the very least, there is one place I will be able to publish it:
Amazon Digital Shorts
More likely, however, I would put it for publishing through Amazon's digital services, which would allow a different pricing structure. Either way, this will allow the manuscript to be read on a Kindle... which... would be very fitting (if you've read the first chapter). I would like to firmly state that the manuscript did begin before the Kindle was released/publically known about.
So on my quest for information regarding my publishing options, I got a chance this past week to meet with David Webb of B&H Publishing House. I was quite pleased to get to know him; he seemed to be a genuinely nice guy who is as passionate about books as my wife is. It didn't hurt that he had artwork from an Alex Ross calendar or a Worf mug in his office, either. What I liked about Webb is that he told it to me straight: there isn't much room for sci-fi in the CBA market.
Seeing as I'm getting my MBA, I was actually quite interested in his perspectives on the market, as well as the future plans for the B&H fiction line, in general. I found it amazing how much the market is geared toward women... as most faith-based products are nowadays. Why aren't men buying faith-based entertainment?
We talked briefly about the struggles I would have with writing a Christian-based sci-fi novel, but he also offered some like a group of authors who recently went on tour promoting their sci-fi and fantasy work. Webb was very encouraging when we got to the end of the conversation, as we both agreed that sci-fi was a great place to explore faith. Being followers of Christ allows us one constant - that God is and always will be God. So even if I place my story 100,000 years in the future... God is still God. And that allows me a world of creativity.
So I now have two assignments:
The pitch is going to be interesting... but I think I might tackle most of it first. There are some things they are looking for that I hadn't really thought out yet. And, the pitch does include the full synopsis. It might be good to decide how my story ends... even though I prefer to discover it along the way.
So... about that novel. I'm still working on it. Maybe you'll get to buy it someday.
In doing things like this, I like to know what all the possibilities are. If I'm going to write this thing; poor my time, energy and ideas into a manuscript... then I want to make sure that there's at least a chance that someone will discover it and enjoy it. I've done some minimal research and found that, at the very least, there is one place I will be able to publish it:
Amazon Digital Shorts
More likely, however, I would put it for publishing through Amazon's digital services, which would allow a different pricing structure. Either way, this will allow the manuscript to be read on a Kindle... which... would be very fitting (if you've read the first chapter). I would like to firmly state that the manuscript did begin before the Kindle was released/publically known about.
So on my quest for information regarding my publishing options, I got a chance this past week to meet with David Webb of B&H Publishing House. I was quite pleased to get to know him; he seemed to be a genuinely nice guy who is as passionate about books as my wife is. It didn't hurt that he had artwork from an Alex Ross calendar or a Worf mug in his office, either. What I liked about Webb is that he told it to me straight: there isn't much room for sci-fi in the CBA market.
Seeing as I'm getting my MBA, I was actually quite interested in his perspectives on the market, as well as the future plans for the B&H fiction line, in general. I found it amazing how much the market is geared toward women... as most faith-based products are nowadays. Why aren't men buying faith-based entertainment?
We talked briefly about the struggles I would have with writing a Christian-based sci-fi novel, but he also offered some like a group of authors who recently went on tour promoting their sci-fi and fantasy work. Webb was very encouraging when we got to the end of the conversation, as we both agreed that sci-fi was a great place to explore faith. Being followers of Christ allows us one constant - that God is and always will be God. So even if I place my story 100,000 years in the future... God is still God. And that allows me a world of creativity.
So I now have two assignments:
- Finish the novel
- Write the pitch
The pitch is going to be interesting... but I think I might tackle most of it first. There are some things they are looking for that I hadn't really thought out yet. And, the pitch does include the full synopsis. It might be good to decide how my story ends... even though I prefer to discover it along the way.
So... about that novel. I'm still working on it. Maybe you'll get to buy it someday.
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