Notes from DragonCon 2013 Part One

Sorry for the big gap in blog posts. I have recently started graduate school and between that, freelance work, and my own writing projects, that's bit into my blogging time considerably.

So here are some notes I took from DragonCon 2013:

*At a branding panel with artist John Picacio, he said art directors are the ones who generally hire artists. To become a successful freelance artist, he recommends building relationships with publishers but also be a member of the fan community via things like attending conventions.

*Many independent authors want book covers but offer too little money. He's turned them down for this reason, but suggested that second rights to an artistic work can be sold for much cheaper.

*Those interested in finding good fantasy art should check out Spectrum or visit DeviantArt. One DA artist has done the covers for several of my Kindle stories, so I've already taken that advice into account.

*At a pulp panel featuring my writer friends James R. Tuck and Delilah S. Dawson, I learned the ideal word count for pulp publisher Airship 27 is 60,000 words. That's what I'm shooting for with The Thing In The Woods, although I fear it might come up short. James has advised me to send Battle for the Wastelands to pulp publishers and once I hear back from some biggies I've already sent it to, I'll take his advice.

*With pulp, there's less need for a back-story.

*Later books in a series can feature a Dramatis Personae that's a recap without being a recap.

*Audible.com is a good place to have your books recorded for audio purposes. I might give that a try with my e-books.

*Nazi rocket planes were fueled by red foaming nitric acid and 100% hydrogen peroxide, both of which will dissolve anything. When mishaps occurred and the chemicals spilled into cockpits, pilots would literally melt. This happened at least once.

*John Ringo is apparently popular in Europe. His father-in-law, a minister in Lithuania, name-dropped Ringo and doubled the number of people at his church services. Meanwhile, either Ringo himself or a friend of his (I can't remember clearly) encountered some German women who were big fans.

*Romantic fiction in Germany is apparently very BDSM/dominance-heavy. Dawson and Ringo discussed the reaction to their books in more-puritanical America and according to Ringo, his Paladin of Shadows novels fit right in but Dawson's steampunk vampire romance is very tame. Ringo's account of the reaction of his mother (and her book club) to Ghost, the first Paladin novel, was hilarious. If you've ever heard of the Internet meme "Oh John Ringo No," it's about the series. Here you go.

*Pyr Books' "Toxic City" novels taking place in a London quarantined due to the use of chemical/biological weapons are being adapted for a television series. However, it's being set in Los Angeles. Given how the first book is London Eye, I'm wondering what they're going to call the series. "Toxic City," according to one of the Pyr panelists, seems like a good bet.

"Battleship" Trailer

The trailer looks surprisingly awesome and there's a good chance I'm going to go see it when it comes out.  Yes, I know it's based on a board game that has no plot.  However, it looks like it's going to be pretty entertaining.

However, one objection: The whole "invincible alien energy shields" thing is overdone.  A friend of mine describe this movie as "Independence Day with ships" and the energy shields go a long way to bolstering his point.  Plus both the 1950s and the 2006-ish version of War of the Worlds used them and they weren't even in the book.

It'd be a lot more creative if the aliens had a nearly impenetrable point-defense capability--perhaps using lasers--that is very good at taking out missiles and aircraft but cannot track artillery shells.  In this situation, the mighty aircraft carriers would be all but neutered and the heavy guns of old-school battleships would be what saves the day.

John Ringo's novels Legacy of the Aldenata novels have used this concept with the Posleen--their defensive weapons are murderous on aircraft and missiles but they're useless in dealing with artillery.

In order to have a big human defeat to presage the final battle, perhaps the carriers launch a massive "Alpha Strike" (a large attack by a carrier air wing) bolstered by huge numbers of cruise missiles fired from the other ships.  The attack is stopped cold with minimal damage to the aliens by a laser point-defense system, but some surviving aircraft pilot points out that when he used his plane's guns, they weren't able to counter it.

Then we get the big naval artillery brought in.  :)

All the Famous People I've Met...

Over the years, especially due to my work as a journalist, I've met a lot of famous people.  Here's a list of all of them I can recall, the circumstances we met, and the articles I wrote about them...

S.M. Stirling-DragonCon 2009.  Sci-fi/AH author.  Discussed Draka novels with him and found out Samothracians had beaten the Draka in a sleeper-ship-on-sleeper-ship fight (mentioned in Drakon) because their ship was better.  I also asked him some questions about his Emberverse novels.

http://accordingtoquinn.blogspot.com/2010/05/dragoncon-2009-sm-stirling-interview.html

John Ringo-DragonCon 2010.  Sci-fi author.  I think I inadvertently offended him with a comment I made about his book Ghost , but patched things up.

http://accordingtoquinn.blogspot.com/2010/09/john-ringo-and-deidre-knight-on-writing.html

Mike Huckabee-Presidential candidate.  He spoke at a church and I covered it for my old newspaper.  I got to ask him a couple of questions beforehand.

http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/7423192/article-Huckabee-delivers-pro-life-message?
http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/7407121/article-Huckabee-undecided-on-2012-presidential-bid?

Eric Johnson-Georgia gubernatorial candidate.  I voted for him in the primary, but he didn't make the runoff.

http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/7954169/article-Gubernatorial-hopeful-makes-stop-in-Griffin?

Ray McBerry-Georgia gubernatorial candidate.  Also spoke at a church and I covered it for my old newspaper.  He seemed nice enough, but then the scandal broke...

http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/5805357/article-Gubernatorial-candidate-McBerry-discusses-issues?

Margaret Weis-Fantasy author.  DragonCon, year unknown.  I think I was in high school at the time.  I'd guess probably 2000, since I think it was pre-9/11.

Sonny Perdue-Former Georgia governor.  Spoke to him at an "active adult" residential dedication and at the Georgia capital.  He kind of had a high-pitched voice and didn't want to talk--he shook my hand and found other places to go.

http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/3302512/article-Leaders-celebrate-Sun-City-opening-Ceremony-attracts-skydivers--governor?

Casey Cagle-Georgia Lieutenant Governor.  Spoke to him at a press function and asked about Sunday alcohol sales.

http://www.northfulton.com/Articles-c-2011-03-01-186090.114126-sub-Continuing-Sunday-alcohol-ban-bad-for-the-state.html

Mike Lee-Warhammer 40,000 novelization author.  He was really cool and funny.

http://accordingtoquinn.blogspot.com/2010/10/my-last-dragoncon-post-featuring-mike.html
http://accordingtoquinn.blogspot.com/2010/09/late-productivity-update.html

Hank Klibanoff-He wrote  The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation and spoke about investigative reporting at the press function I met Cagle at.  I've got a copy of his speech and some notes and I'll blog about it in the near future.  I'll also be sure to take a look at the book if the library's got it.

Chief Jay Strongbow-Retired professional wrestler.  I did a feature about him for my old newspaper.

http://www.griffindailynews.com/view/full_story/3312186/article-Wrestling-legend-to-be-inducted-into-Hall-of-Fame?

John Ringo and Deidre Knight on Writing

I went to DragonCon pretty much all day Friday through Sunday and spent most of the time at writing panels. Last night, on the way back to the MARTA station where I'd parked after church, I turned around and headed back for the "In The Beginning: What You Need to Know" panel.

The most memorable author present was John Ringo, a military science fiction author who writes for Baen Books, and to a lesser extent Deidre Knight.

Ringo described how he had a 47,000-word first novel that was truly, horrifically bad and will never see the light of day.  He described it as a hybrid of fantasy and cyberpunk and how it did not have consistent tenses, among other problems.

(Apparently his bad first novel was not the infamous Ghost, first in the series The Paladin of Shadows and the origin of the "Oh John Ringo No" Internet meme.  I thought that one was the bad first novel that someone persuaded him to sell, but it turns out Ringo didn't want it published under his own name but Baen himself insisted on taking a look at it first.)

He then described how he wrote A Hymn Before Battle on a yellow notepad while pulling all-nighters as a security guard.  He'd submitted it to Baen, where he was a regular member of the company's internet forum, and made a reference to being in the company's slush pile while debating the "aquatic ape hypothesis" with the late Jim Baen, the founder of the company.

(If you want to know more about that, just google it or check out this well-reviewed book: Aquatic Ape Hypothesis.)

Ringo received a rejection letter and then an e-mail from Baen saying that the manuscript had been lost.  Ringo sent the manuscript back and mentioned that it had already been rejected.  Baen read and line-edited the entire manuscript in 24 hours, fired the reader who'd rejected it, and told Ringo he'd buy it if Ringo made the edits he wanted.  He also wanted the manuscript for the sequel Gust Front, which Ringo had already begun writing.  Ringo sent in the manuscript as it was, which ended in the middle of a battle in the middle of a prepositional phrase.

At this point in the discussion, Knight took over.  She described several "false starts" over the years before writing fan-fiction for the TV program Roswell got her back into writing permanently.  She said it was good practice with plotting and other disciplines and reader feeback encouraged her to write more.  Her later fan-fiction diverged greatly from the original series, to the point that although her protagonists were named "Max" and "Liz," they were radically different from the show's characters (living in Los Angeles, among other things).

I think I've got a bit in common with her.  My first two finished novels are actually alternate-universe Harry Potter fan-fics, The Wrath of the Half-Blood Prince and Lord of the Werewolves, which I co-wrote. 

One reason I was able to finish those while my original novels languished is because I had a horde of readers wanting updates soon.  Thanks to my writing group and the need to produce chapters for each meeting, I might be able to finish my post-apocalyptic steampunk Western Escape from the Wastelands in a similar manner.

But back to the panel...

"What what you like and try to find the market," Ringo advised as the discussion took a different turn.

He said not to dismiss the eBook and small and medium presses.  He said he knows people who make more money with those than with the larger presses because although they sell fewer copies, they make more per book.  He said the iPad will hurt traditional publishing, especially on the distribution side.

Knight described how her first book was sold via a small press and released in digital form before being printed.  She cautioned the writers against self-publishing via Kindle to get 80% of the revenues, since traditional publishers provide line-editing and other services.

Ringo agreed, citing both professional line-editors and cover artists.  He said good eBooks are also hard to find--it's like reading a slush pile.  He predicted that the future of writing will be via "web-scription" services like those provided by Baen.

He also described how distributing content for free can be, in the long run, financially beneficial.  Apparently the first Wheel of Time novel, The Eye of the World, was given away at WaldenBooks (then the biggest bookseller) for free.  The sequel, The Great Hunt, sold massively, as did the many successors.  He said the free distribution of the first book ultimately made the entire series more financially successful than the series would have been ordinarily.

Overall, that was a fun and useful panel to attend.  I guess the fact that my church friends were out of town and thus not available for dinner afterward had a silver lining.