Best Non-European Fantasy (Semifinal 2)

What is the best non European fantasy setting?

There won't be nearly as long on our second semifinal round as our first since A) July is already half over and we need to get on this thing and B) I'm not running a Kickstarter at peak stress this time around. So I will combine these results with our first semifinal round in only ONE week.

Don't waste any time voting.  

Everyone will get three votes (3). The top four names of each poll will go on to the final round. Before you simply vote for your favorite four, consider that, as there is no ranking of those four votes; each vote beyond one dilutes the power of your choices a little more. So if you have a genuine favorite–or pair of favorites–it's better to use as few votes as possible.

The poll itself is on the left side, at the bottom of the side menus.

Best Non-European Fantasy (Semifinal 1 Results)

Our first semifinal round is done, and I was elated to see a huge spread between the going-on-to-the-next-round cut off and the here-are-some-lovely-parting-gifts choices. Everything from Hundred Thousand Kingdoms up will be going on to the final round.

Image Description: Poll Results (available in text format at https://polldaddy.com/polls/9453849/results/)

Interestingly for how....passionate people seemed during the nomination process, we didn't end up with that many votes. Hopefully it was just my fault for losing focus due to the Kickstarter and letting things dribble out. But don't forget that you pick the nominees and make the polls happen. 

I'll announce it tomorrow, but technically the second round poll is already up if you want to vote now–lower left as always.

Kickstarter Results and Final Thoughts (Personal Update)

Enlarge to admire tongue piercing.
Image Description: Me with celebratory hands up
and mouth wide open and excited

My Kickstarter finished this weekend!!

This is awesome for two reasons: Number one, we closed out at juuuuuuuuuust shy of $11,000.

There are a lot of things I could say to my detractors who thought I picked a very unfortunate path to financial writing solvency. They furrowed their brows when the take-home message I got from our SFSU guests was that the entire publishing industry was changing right in front of our eyes, clucked when I started a blog, sucked their teeth when I opted out of traditional publishing, looked down their noses when I invested time in self promotion and social media outreach, and made sure I knew (and I mean in no uncertain terms) that they did not consider my fledgling career to be "real" if I was not pursuing literary journals, an agent, and/or an MFA in literature. Many are now scratching their heads wondering how in the name of Apollo's right nut I was able to score a tidy advance on a debut novel (that I won't actually have to pay back).

And, as I say, there are many things I could say to these detractors.

After much thought and consideration, however, I've decided to take the low road. "Neener neener. Who's 'dumping a lot of wasted effort' now? Eh PROF?"

Of course I can't get too obnoxious without simultaneously thanking all of you. It's a humbling and uplifting experience to have people quite literally give you free money on the promise that what you are going to do with it is, we hope, totally cool.

The amount pledged is more than enough to supplement current incomes and for long enough to get the whole book written (not just a first draft). It's also enough to hire both a content and a copy editor towards the end of the process so that the polish is a little finer than most self published books. And because we hit the fourth stretch goal, I'll be releasing the book through e-format and print-on-demand formats.

All of this is a little over a year out. (You'll probably start to see the release date information in early fall of 2017.)

It's also awesome for a second reason: You won't have to read about it every single week anymore!

Here's where we are now.

• It's still another three weeks before I can sit down and really start in on this book. It's also another three weeks until all blog systems are fully functional with power levels in the green.
• In the next three weeks, we should see more and more blog sub-systems come back online one-by-one including "meatier" posts, vlogging (never forgot about this), weekend light weight posts, blogging for other blogs, and short fiction.
• It's still another two weeks before I am done with summer school, so we might need a bit more jazz hands periodically.
• Radiation ends tomorrow, and family left this weekend, and the Kickstarter is over (as exciting as it was, it was stressful and took a bit of energy to promote). You should begin to notice an uptick in blog post quality quite soon.
• And thank you so much for your patience through all of this.

I also remind everyone that tomorrow I will be posting the second semifinal round of our July poll for Best Non European Fantasy, so if you want to vote for who will go on to the finals, today is your last chance.

Final Kickstarter Push

Image description: Book with light and magic symbols
coming out of it.

14 Hours to go in my book-funding Kickstarter!

If there were ever a time to share this link along with a couple of words of why you hope people who don't know me might want to give a buck or two, today would be the day.  

And if we pull out another $1200, there will be professional cover art instead of a non-copyrighted WWII picture of an explosion photoshopped next to a picture of ridiculously photogenic guy running away from evil wizards who have been sketched in pencil as creative commons on Ravalry. Oh and also professional formatting assistance so there are no one word pages.

And if we don't, I came far, far further than I ever could have dreamed, and will get my ass to the grindstone in exactly 24 days.

Next Monday we'll begin our slow process of returning Writing About Writing to its regularly scheduled programming. As family leaves, radiation finishes, summer school ends, and finally as I move out and get settled the time for writing will conversely amp up.

Kickstarter Update

I woke up to over $10k pledged to my Kickstarter. (http://kck.st/1TV2MQp)

I would say something cliche like "I don't even have words," but then you all might doubt that you had put your faith into the right writer because that's kind of what we do....

Read the full update through our Kickstarter 


Also, the current flex goal we're working on involves cover art and professional help with formatting (so there's still a chance to back this project and make it even better):


Flex Goal #5 $12,500 (Looking good Triexta. Looking real good!) Often one can really tell when they're looking at a self published book. The cover is nondescript and there are numerous formatting and kerning errors in the print. They just don't look as good as the books from a publisher.  At this level I will commission a piece of professional artwork from A Grey Artistry for Triexta's cover. I will also solicit professional assistance in making sure that the formatting of both the e-reader and the print on demand version is as close to professional quality as I can get.

Truthsome Liar (Part 2)

Image description: Firefly logo

Reminder: We are currently in week two of the Fortnight of Ultimate Doom™, which is in the Month of Unquestioning Horror™, firmly ensconced in the Six Weeks of Countless Tiny Terrors™all of which is in the Year of Absolute Shitfully Shit™ (Heck, even though it's the exciting kind of stress, the final hours of the Kickstarter are contributing.) While Writing About Writing's systems will begin to come back on line one by one starting in about a week when family clears out of this house, and continuing on through the end of radiation, the culmination of summer school, and finally my move, right now we are hitting the textbook definition of JAZZ HANDS pretty hard and trying hard–oh so hard–not to simply put the blog on hiatus.

So I'm going to continue my post about a dream I had recently.

(Serenity spoilers ahead.)

Continued from part 1

There are a few of things to understand about my Firefly dreams.

One is that Malcolm Reynolds always knows I'm dreaming....but I don't. That's extremely weird for me. In fact, I can't think of another dream I've ever had where one of the characters knows I'm dreaming but I don't. I often know I'm dreaming, and can even control myself to some degree, and once in a blue moon, I can control and direct the dream itself, but not my Firefly dreams. I'm always deep "in character" in those dreams. But Malcolm always knows the truth. He's the one who explains to me what's going on, usually to tell me that I need to wake up and get to writing.

The second is that I fly the ship and flying the ship seems to me to be a metaphor for creativity. Some dreams seem to have Wash and Shepherd Book alive, and in some I sort of am Wash. And in some he seems to have experienced his fate at the end of a ship to ship harpoon, but regardless, I'm flying the ship and my proficiency is linked to my writing life. "Here's something you can't do," I say before I post a viral article Shirtstorm.

Perhaps the most important thing to understand about these dreams is that there are two forces we are constantly trying to avoid–forces that are ever working against us. The first is the Alliance. And the Alliance is a boring real world. It's paying bills. It's working a day job. It's dental appointments. It can be temporarily avoided but never escaped. It is a throbbing nexus of bureaucracy and the inevitable encroachment of the mundane into my world. It's constantly encroaching and no matter how far we go, we can feel its reach. When I am feeling my writing being syphoned off by too many appointments, kid watching sessions, and unfortunate banal conversations about the length of toilet spigot parts, I may dream about being detained by the Alliance or losing a shipment because the Alliance held us up. And of course ultimately if they ever find out we're harboring fugitives they desperately don't want to lose, we'll probably all end up in their custody forever.

The other force has also to do with time, or rather the lack of it, but it isn't full of bureaucracy and procedure. It is a never sated maw that wants to suck up every writing moment and leave me a failure. It wants to ruin me in its wake and scuttle the ship. Unlike the inexorable, high profile metastasizing of the Alliance, this force moves unseen. It slips behind the umbras of moons and through the magnetic interference of planetary poles, threatening me from every corner and it will destroy Serenity's ability to fly (my creativity) if given half the chance and kill us all. It is savage and it will take no prisoners.

Rather I should say THEY will take no prisoners. Reavers.

So my dream picked up right about at the third reel of Serenity. And in standard dream logic it was somehow post Wash and different even though it was using a lot of the same lines and moments.

"Bastard's not even changing course," the operative said.

Image description: Serenity movie Gif

"Mal, I can't fly between them both," I said. "I can't do this."

"Son, I can fly well enough to aim this rig," Mal said.  "If I didn't think you could get us down in one piece, you wouldn't be in that chair."

"I don't...." I said. "I can't...."

Mal put his hand on my shoulder. "Do you know what 'Alea iacta est' means? It means we're stuck between Alliance and Reavers and they both mean to end our trip a little sooner than'd be my preference. If anyone can get us away from the reavers without landing right in the Alliance hanger bays, it's you. Don't live in the shadow of other pilots. You tell YOUR story."

"My STORY?" I said, growing confused.

"You got this, Chris. Now wake up and write like a leaf on the wind."

He paused and blinked. "Just...you know....maybe not that exact expression."

Then I woke up.

The Best of the Mailbox (A Tour of Menus)

Image description: USPS public post box.

If you want a question answered on The Mailbox, just put "For The Mailbox" in your subject line in an email tochris.brecheen@gmail.com .  I will use your first name unless you tell me explicitly that I can use your whole name and/or you would prefer to remain completely anonymous.  I can't promise I'll post everything I get, that I'll respond to abject stupidity, or that I'm going to keep posting every anonymous attempt to hurt my feelings if I have anything else to use instead, but if you write a thoughtful question or comment--even if it disagrees with me--I'll will honestly do my best to try to get it up here and write a little something in reply.  

If we ever get to a point where there's just too much mail to answer it all, I'll pick the best questions and comments (which I promise won't simply be the most complementary). 

Rage Against the Brecheen: Hate mail--and my response to it--does so well, it deserves its own menu. Come see the teeming millions of the internet (usually anonymously) try to take me down a peg or two.

Comic Sans                                                                              That "What the Author Meant" Meme
My Top Three Achievements                                                   Bits and Pieces
Grammar Questions I Have No Business Answering               Revision Land
What Does "Good Writing" Look Like                                       Recant. Reflect. Refine.
Giving Thanks and the Oxford Comma                                    Writing Every Day
Unsupportive GF's Wrath and My Stance on Grammar            Facebook Questions
The Value of TV/Movies to a Writer                                         Speech to Text Software/Season2
What Do I Want From Writing About Writing?                          Just How Much Do You Make?
Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel                                             Should I Outline My Book?
Why can't I make money?  My friends like me                         Whatever Works
Overcoming Inertia/ Sans Love of Writing                               Critique Groups
Strangely Inappropriate Non-Writing Questions                      Traditional vs Digital Publishing
"Creepy Guy Feedback" Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4              Little Kid's Grammar
Feedback and Follow Up (Q's about past Mailboxes)              Coming Out As Feminist
Is There Anything GOOD About an MFA?                             Questions From Facebook
Is Dead Poets Society a Shitty Movie or What                      The W.A.W. "Chris's" Persona
Why Is the Publishing Industry so Whitewashed?                 What is avant garde?
How Do I Describe Things?                                                     Tropeception Part 1 Part 2
The PC Police                                                                         Cultural Appropriation
Character Driven Zombie Stories                                           Jones and Pratchett on "Real" Literature 
What About Harper Lee's New Book                                     How Do I Write A First Sentence?
I Just Can't Write                                                                     Writing For Income
                              


Can't find what you are looking for? Or maybe just can't get enough of these amazing answers?

Not every mailbox is destined for greatness.  Some of them have ended up down in the basement: The Not So Best of the Mailbox.