New Year, New Cover for THE THING IN THE WOODS

The first cover for The Thing in the Woods, originally published by Canadian small press Digital Fiction Publishing, was assembled from two pieces of Adobe stock art I found for the publisher. However, the cover for its independently-published sequel The Atlanta Incursion was illustrated by artist Matt Cowdery and laid out by designer Mikio Murikami. Although the fonts are the same, the illustrative style is very different and this is something that has been remarked upon.

Well, since Cowdery's art has been highly praised by pretty much everybody I run into at in-person events and he has done the cover for the planned third novel The Walking Worm, it's time to make the whole "Long War" series consistent. Furthermore, according to some writing podcasts I listen to, a new cover is a good way to spike sales for an older book.

So here's Cowdery's cover for Thing, featuring male lead James Daly and female lead Amber Webb (her first canonical image) confronting the titular horror.

Both the e-book and print book are now live with the new cover. Enjoy!

Productivity Update 7/13/21

It's been awhile since I've posted an update on my current projects. However, I saw that Chris Nuttall had done that and that reminded me. So let's start with my current primary focus...

Serpent Sword: Battle for the Wastelands #2-There are ten completed chapters, and between those and the partial chapters later on, I have a total word count of 53,694. I think the finish product will be somewhat longer than the original Battle for the Wastelands' 89,000 words, so I'm about halfway through perhaps? I already have the cover art (see below) and have written the book copy, but even if I complete the manuscript in, say, October or November, tasks like hiring a professional editor, revising, formatting, finding another author to blurb it, etc. will take time and then releasing it in December might not be a wise idea. It might be better to hold off until early 2022.

I've noticed that at conventions and on Amazon (especially after the BookBub featured deal), the "Long War" novels The Thing in the Woods and The Atlanta Incursion sell significantly better than Battle and its prequel novella "Son of Grendel." Consequently, once I have Serpent Sword out the door, it is my plan to swing back to that series and put out the third novel The Walking Worm (book copy here) and then the fourth novel, Shadowmen before returning to the Wastelands world with the third book, tentatively titled Escape.

(Once Serpent Sword is published, I'm going to try for a BookBub featured deal for Battle on the grounds that an available sequel would make it more likely to get approval and ultimately more profitable--people might get Battle for $0.99 and then pay full price for Serpent Sword and "SOG." If BookBub does for the Wastelands series what it did for Thing and TAI, I might do Escape before Shadowmen, but the Wastelands world is weird--it's secondary-world fantasy without magic, it's steampunk and post-apocalyptic but it's not in our world, etc. And generally horror sells better than steampunk.)

I have already started writing TWW and Shadowmen, although I don't think I have any completed chapters. TWW's current word count is 16,504 and Shadowmen's word count is 11,236. I can definitely complete TWW in 2022 and I could potentially complete Shadowmen in 2022 as well, given how the "Long War" series is less research-heavy than Wastelands and in particular Shadowmen takes place in the same town as Thing.

Like Serpent Sword, I already have the cover for The Walking Worm made. Here you go. That's MJ-12 agent Thomas Bolton (who first appears briefly in Thing but is in TAI a lot more) on the left and our hero James Daly on the right.

Finally, in April I completed the short story "Run, Hide, Feed" and submitted it to a modern-monster collection. They chose not to include it and it was rejected by an online horror magazine soon after. There are still some pro-rate horror publications I haven't submitted to, although the subject matter (it was written to comment on U.S. mass shootings, in particular the amount of media attention paid to the shooters) makes it a bit of a hot potato. We shall see.

Two THE ATLANTA INCURSION #BookTube Reviews In Two Days

One strategy I've been using to promote my work is seeking out booktubers to discuss my books on their channels. Early-mid May has been, to quote the great Borat, "Very nice." I have gotten two largely positive video reviews on YouTube for my novel The Atlanta Incursion, the sequel to The Thing In The Woods.

Here's the one posted May 9 from Jeremy Fee, a Texan who liked the small-town feel of the original Thing and followed the survivors to the big city for the sequel:

And here's the one posted May 10 from Lady Jane Books, who got very excited about it:

This was a very nice couple of days. If you're interested after watching these videos, you can find both The Thing in the Woods and The Atlanta Incursion on Amazon. They're both in Kindle Unlimited. And if you're not, check out their YouTube channels--they might have books you would enjoy.

The Cover and Book Copy For THE WALKING WORM

Over the last few months I haven't been writing as much as I'd like to and spending a lot of time on writing-adjacent activities like marketing. One of those activities is arranging for cover art, since getting a good cover, getting it designed and laid out, etc. is dependent on other people in a way that actually writing isn't. I'd actually finished The Atlanta Incursion well before the publication date, but I had to get all this other stuff taken care of.

So I decided to get the cover for The Walking Worm, the second sequel to The Thing In The Woods, done well in advance of actually finishing the manuscript. Considering my tendencies to dawdle, the fact I'd shelled out for a high-end cover gives me a strong incentive to actually finish the manuscript and start paying that cover off.

So here's the cover by the mighty Matt Cowdery:

This is the first canonical image of series protagonist James Daly (right) and MJ-12 agent Thomas Bolton (left), who briefly appears in Thing and plays a much larger role in TAI. James is a college freshman in TAI, while Bolton is probably in his early 40s.

(In some back-story I've written for Bolton he was an early 20s rookie MIB in 1993. If the series goes well, young Bolton will have his own prequel novel, The Battle of Dulce Base.)

And here's the current draft of the back-cover copy. The book includes the mythology introduced in TAI, but is a small-town creature feature more in the vein of Thing. Spoilers for TAI if you haven't read it yet..

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

At long last James Daly has finally gotten to UNC Chapel Hill , but every dream comes with a cost. James works for MJ-12, a covert agency that has fought extraterrestrial colonization since the 1940s, and now faces a threat much closer to home…

Now a junior, James is part of UNC Chapel Hill’s ROTC program, a disguise for his real role serving in the secret war against the murderous alien Grays and, since the defeat of the Thing in the Woods and the battle beneath Atlanta a year ago, keeping watch for the predatory Kraken. And although he’s achieved his childhood dream, there’s trouble in paradise. His girlfriend Amber Webb won’t move in with him and, more dangerously, a fellow MJ-12 agent has disappeared in a nearby town.

James’ investigation alongside senior MJ-12 agent Thomas Bolton, whom he blames for the death of his best friend Eli Schwartz, results in an awful revelation. A creature spawned from the last underground nuclear tests has taken root, its telepathic powers a match for James’ own strange talents. To find its missing agent, MJ-12 must do battle against fellow Americans infested with deadly parasites, a battle that could stretch the secret agency’s capability to its very limits.

Right now I've completed about 16,000 words in TWW. Since Thing is 56,000 words and TAI around 60,000, I would expect this to be around the same length. At the rate things are going and given how I want to run the entire manuscript through writing group and then have it professionally edited, I would expect this sometime late next year.

Finding My Books at Libraries...

Many moons ago, while listening to the writers' podcast The Sell More Books Show, one of the hosts suggested a good way to get readers was to donate books to libraries. This advice I followed, donating copies of the first edition of Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire and later The Thing In The Woods to the Cobb County library system, the library system I grew up using.

When I started seriously self-publishing, however, I took that strategy into overdrive. Here's a running list of the library systems that have my books.

Georgia

Cobb County: Like I mentioned earlier, a copy of Thing and two copies of FSFF, both at the central library in Marietta. I recently donated an additional copy of Thing, two copies of its sequel The Atlanta Incursion, and two copies of Battle for the Wastelands. Those have not yet been catalogued, but I will check again and update this post as needed.

Gwinnett County: The Gwinnett County library system has got two copies each of Thing and its sequel The Atlanta Incursion, which so far comprise my Lovecraft-inspired "Long War" fictional universe. Both copies of TAI are kept at the headquarters location, but one copy of Thing is at the headquarters and another is at the Suwanee branch. I'd donated one copy each already, but I saw on the website an absolutely absurd amount of holds for TAI--at one point I think as many as eight people were in line for it--and a significant number for Thing too. In early October I donated an additional copy each of Thing and TAI and they were logged in the system within a few days. As of November 9, 2020 there are four holds on two copies of TAI and zero holds on two copies of Thing. I'm not sure why I'm so popular in Gwinnett, but maybe I'll donate more if the backlog continues.

And the Long War series isn't the only thing I've got in Gwinnett. There's also a copy of Battle for the Wastelands at the Five Forks branch. That one is available now, so there probably isn't nearly so much demand. I also donated a copy of Little People, Big Guns and that's available at the Collins Hill branch. That's under "Matthew Quinn" rather than "Matthew W. Quinn," so it doesn't show up in the same author search. The library also has "Son of Grendel"  at its Collins Hill branch, so the system has all of the Wastelands series so far. It also has my short story collection Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire at its Lawrenceville branch.

(And perhaps when the pandemic eases enough people are comfortable with live events, maybe I'll see if a Gwinnett library is willing to host one.)

PINES: This statewide library network serves most counties in Georgia and I made ample use of it when I lived in Lovejoy and McDonough. I donated a Thing copy to the Griffin-Spalding County Library in Griffin when I was selling books at the town's Mistletoe Market some years ago. That copy is still there, while a copy one of the library staff purchased at the Next Chapter Con North Georgia independent authors event the year before last is at the Dalton-Whitfield Library in Dalton. More recently, I was interviewed in the Dalton newspaper and donated several of my books to the Dalton-Whitfield and Calhoun-Gordon libraries and the Athens-Clarke librarians bought a copy each of Thing and TAI at an event I did earlier in 2022. PINES now has three copies of Thing, three copies of TAI, one copy of Battle, one copy of "Son of Grendel," and one copy of Little People. People from all over Georgia can read them now. :)

DeKalb County: The DeKalb County library system has got three copies of Battle, one at the Dunwoody branch, one at the Decatur branch, and one at the Tucker branch. It also has a copy each of Thing at the Tucker branch and the Decatur branch and TAI at the Tucker and Decatur branches as well. At the 2019 Decatur Book Festival I checked with library staff and the copy of Thing at the Decatur branch had been checked out three times, something I rather liked. Little People, Big Guns has a copy each at the Decatur and Stonecrest branches.

Fulton County: The Fulton County library system has got two copies of Thing, one at the Peachtree library in Midtown and the other at the Wolf Creek library in the southern part of the county. The library also has a single copy of Battle for the Wastelands and Little People Big Guns, both at its central library in downtown Atlanta.

Kentucky

Carter County: Two members of a conservative-leaning writers group I'm in organized a book drive for the Carter County public library system after reading in another Facebook group that the library system is in severe need of books--they had only eight science fiction and fantasy books in the whole library system, for example. I donated single copies of Thing, TAI, Battle, SOG, HFQ, FSFF, and LPBG over the summer of 2021 and they have since been catalogued. The Carter County libraries are located in the towns of Olive Hill and Grayson.

Facebook Ads *Avoiding* Kindle Unlimited

In the past I've posted here extensively about my various Facebook ad campaigns. Although Facebook ads moved copies in ways that Amazon ads generally didn't, none of my earlier campaigns made a profit. The closest I ever came was making $43 royalties on $50 spend. Although there were times money from con sales or random hand sales could cover those costs, COVID-19 means a lot fewer conventions and those remaining are a lot smaller.

However, in early August I wondered if my ads might've been flawed--in order to make it clear that I was selling e-books (i.e. I didn't want people thinking the book I was selling was a video game, then costing me money by clicking and deciding not to buy) and attracting people with the magical word "free," I emphasized the book was "free on Kindle Unlimited." This meant thousands of Kindle Unlimited page-views per month, but at slightly under half a cent per page read, this came out to $4.80 per 1,000 pages read--aka not much even if I got thousands of page-reads (and believe me I did). Even though I made outright sales, no combination of sales and KU page-reads covered the costs. This applied even when I released The Atlanta Incursion, the sequel to The Thing in the Woods and advertised Thing in hopes people would buy it and then move onto the next book. Furthermore, based on my experience KU readers seem less likely to review than people who made full purchases and I was in severe need of reviews, especially for TAI.

So I created a new $100 Facebook ad for Thing with ad copy stating it was "available in e-book and print" rather than "free on Kindle Unlimited." Based on advice from a Facebook ad consultant (buy enough ads and they'll start wanting to call you to chat), I was also sure to include "engaged shoppers" as a behavioral characteristic--per the consultant these were people who are more likely to buy things. I also made sure to max out the spend at $5 per day, which is a recommendation I got from Help My Facebook Ads Suck, meaning an ad campaign running from 8/8 to 8/28.

The first day went pretty well. I sold two e-books of Thing and one e-book of TAI for a $6.18 royalties gross on $3.91 ad spend for a net of $2.27. There were also a few Kindle Unlimited page-reads, but we're talking less than a dollar. The sale of TAI took a little effort on my part--one person who commented on the Thing ad said he'd like to see the back-story for the titular monstrosity and I told him it would be in TAI, which was now available. He was glad to see it and bought it. I made another such sale on 8/10 (in which I suggested making a two-for-one series buy), so let that be a lesson--engage your fans on the Facebook posts. :)

Of course, one good day doesn't make a profitable campaign or a wise strategy, so I watched and I waited. Even after the campaign formally ended, I held off on commenting for a few days in order for the last Kindle Unlimited reads to come in and see if any sales came off the shares of the boosted post (there were 12 shares).

As of morning 8/29 when the post was no longer boosted, Thing and TAI between them had nine e-book sales and one paperback sale for Thing (per Amazon for royalties of $21.28) and five e-book sales for TAI ($10.30 royalties) during the advertising period. No additional sales were made for either book on 8/29, but the day did feature nearly 400 KU pages read for Thing. The Kindle Unlimited revenue for Thing in this period as $21.83 (a little over 4,500 page-views) and for TAI was approximately $3.55 (739 page-views). Overall, the ad campaign generated $56.96, $59.02 if one counts a Thing sale made 9/1 that might've been from a shared post. There's actually a decent amount of read-through from Thing to TAI in terms of purchases, but not nearly as much in KU. Also got one new review for Thing from one of the people I engaged with on Facebook, but no TAI--that's later on her reading list.

Ironically in July I had 19 Thing sales and 3,167 KU pages read, with a Facebook ad emphasizing Kindle Unlimited. There were nine TAI sales and 1,071 KU pages read (although this is skewed by the fact the book premiered in July), but even with those the ad didn't cover its costs. And this new ad ran for much longer at a lower cost per-day. I'm thinking that emphasizing free on KU might be a good idea, not a bad one. However, I also suspect I'm reaching the point of diminishing returns, even if one treats advertising as a loss-leader rather than something that should pay for itself each and every time.

(Bad idea--Samhain Publishing at one point had a banner ad in Times Square advertising to millions who'd never buy their books when that same money advertising in genre magazines would've been much more useful.)

However, before I decide on no more Facebook ads (at least until the third and perhaps fourth "Long War" books are done for more series read-through), there are more avenues I have yet to explore.

Firstly, as part of a multi-author promotion, I have set Thing to $0.99 from 9/2 to 9/7. I could advertise that on Facebook, hoping that the fact there's a sale generates more interest and that KU reads and read-through into TAI compensates for the greatly reduced royalties (35% on anything below $2.99 but 67% on $2.99 to $9.99). After all, I advertised Battle For The Wastelands when it was free as a COVID morale-booster and moved not only 250 free copies but at least some KU reads from people who didn't want to have the book permanently. And I got some reviews on Goodreads and perhaps on Amazon, something that TAI in particular needs. With the Augusta Toy and Comic Show coming up this weekend (Sept. 5-6) and the Next Chapter Con Sept. 19, I can afford another loss-leading ad.

Secondly, one of my reviewers (I can't remember whom) suggested that one really didn't need to read Thing to enjoy TAI. In late July after the presumed premiere boost wore out, I'd spent $100 on a Facebook ad selling TAI to fans of the Lovecraftian role-playing game Call of Cthulhu, horror fiction, and e-books (that didn't cover its costs and didn't even generate that many clicks for that matter), but blogger Matt Stienberg explicitly compared TAI to the X-Com game series. Given the focus on the Gray aliens on the cover art and throughout the book, X-Com fans might be a better target market for TAI on its own. Thing is, so long as TAI doesn't have any Amazon reviews, that might be quite a risk even if I emphasize that magical word "free" and use the KU ad copy.

Thirdly, I could send people to the Amazon series page showing off Thing and TAI together. That might be better to wait until I have more books, since a two-book series isn't exactly impressive.

Another alternative is to continue advertising but not spend so much money. Although the longer ad campaigns made more sales and grossed more, they also lost more money. Meanwhile, the $50 ad buy came within $7 of breaking even, and that was pushing Thing without TAI.

We'll see. I'll need to make a quick decision if I want to push the $0.99 campaign.

My First #Booktube Videos

One of my strategies for promoting my "Long War" science fiction/horror series--The Thing in the Woods and The Atlanta Incursion thus far--was querying #booktube for people to do review videos about the books. I queried several YouTube book enthusiasts and the first to agree was Books of Blood.

Here's the video he did on Thing:



Here's the review he did on The Atlanta Incursion, which he liked better.



I also queried about my "Dark Tower meets Game of Thrones" indie novel Battle for the Wastelands. The #booktuber Mindy's Book Journey agreed to take a look, and here it is.



I've queried a lot more #booktubers since then, so let's hope this strategy continues to bear fruit.

THE ATLANTA INCURSION, Sequel to THE THING IN THE WOODS, Is Here!

Nearly two years after I completed and submitted it for publication, The Atlanta Incursion, the more science fiction-oriented sequel to my debut horror novel The Thing in the Woods, is now available for purchase. As of the time of this writing, the e-book and paperback have not yet linked--if you prefer your books physical, here is the paperback version.

Thing stood on its own, but the way my imagination works, I soon started devising new adventures for the characters that survived what went down in small-town Edington, GA. Before the cult of the ancient tentacle god got involved, male lead James Daly was planning on going to Georgia State University to get his core curriculum done in preparation to transfer to his parents' alma mater, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, while female lead Amber Webb was heading for Valdosta State University to double major in PR and theater.

SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS

Although both survived, neither survived unscathed. James in particular is afflicted by insomnia and post-traumatic stress, while Amber, though less overtly traumatized, blames herself for the death of her distant in-law Sam Dixon. Furthermore, both of them are now dating--Amber had been crushing on him before and although James would grudgingly admit liking her too, he'd thought he could do better in college. Owing to their shared battle against the titular monster and its worshipers, things changed. Although Atlanta-Valdosta is not much as far as long-distance relationships go, things are going to get interesting when James finishes his core curriculum.

And this new adventure brings us additional characters. We'll meet James' close friend Eli, who's mentioned in Thing, as well as completely new Javion Jackson. When I wrote the book in 2016-2018, #Occupy and #BLM were things that had apparently come and gone (Thing and TAI both take place in 2010), but recent events dramatically revived the latter and the concerns raised by the former never really went away. As the book takes place during the lead-up to these social movements, those two characters in particular reflect them.

And shout-out to Armand Rosamilia. Not only did he produce a podcast episode discussing Thing, but he also provided an author blurb for TAI.

"Another topnotch monstrous tale. I loved the first one and this is even better!"

Buy My Books Direct!

Owing to the cancellation of numerous conventions and other in-person events, I'm taking a page from author Wesley Southard and offering my books direct for sale. Signed by me, of course, and prices include postage. :)

(U.S. only, owing to high cost of mailing internationally. Sending two copies of Little People, Big Guns to Great Britain cost $25.)

Battle for the Wastelands-I describe this book as "Dark Tower meets Game of Thrones," while steampunk/dieselpunk author (Jack Connor) called it "a rip-roaring post-apocalyptic adventure." In a world rebuilding after a long-ago apocalypse, a young man joins a rebellion against a steampunk Norse tyrant who has problems of his own. One reviewer called it a "steampunk Cormac McCarthy," while another reviewer compared it to Fallout New Vegas. I have plenty of copies, so this won't be a problem. $12.00, including postage, but $18.00 if you include the prequel novella below.

"Son of Grendel"-This Battle prequel novella follows Grendel's eldest son Falki Grendelsson on a counterinsurgency mission. Since Falki is by modern standards biracial (his late mother was from a pan-Asian ethnicity and he takes after her in looks), we explore of the racial politics in this world in addition to various battle scenes. $8 by itself, but see above for the combined deal.

And did I mention there's a dinosaur? :)

The Thing in the Woods-This is Lovecraftian horror set in suburbanizing Georgia as opposed to rural New England. James Daly, a teenager from Atlanta, sees something he shouldn't in the small town his family moved to in order to afford a bigger house. Now he's being hunted by a cult that's been worshiping an alien horror since before the Civil War and only a renegade cult member and the local girl he doesn't like liking can help. I Never Meant To Start a Murder Cult author Darrell Grizzle said it's "highly recommended for fans of eldritch horror in a realistic, modern-day setting" and this gentleman who sounds like a military veteran liked it despite not ordinarily being a fan of horror. $12.00, including postage, but you can get it for $20 with the sequel below. I'll carry the extra postage costs.

The Atlanta Incursion-James Daly is now a student at Georgia State University, trying to his best to forget the horrors of his senior year. However, just in time for his girlfriend to visit him one October, he begins seeing things...not just the monster of Edington, but Gray aliens. The Men In Black get involved and soon it's war in downtown Atlanta. Here's a Goodreads review from #booktuber Carla's Book Bits. $12.00, including postage, but if you buy the first book too I'll give you a two-for-$20 deal and eat the postage.

Little People, Big Guns-A quartet of Oklahoma little people (they generally don't like being called "midgets") face off against predatory badgers that killed one of their own, only to find a much greater evil at work. Inspired by a story from the British tabloid The Sunday Sport that actually went viral worldwide. Blurbed by horror writers Brian Keene and Wesley Southard. This reviewer on Amazon said it's hard to deliver on the promise of the blurb, but I did it. $10.00, including postage.

Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire-This is a collection of several of my published short stories and some that were never published individually. The book also includes some behind-the-scenes content, such as how the science fiction short story "Illegal Alien" was inspired by the 2006 "Si Se Puede" immigration protests and "Lord of the Dolorous Tower" was originally the prologue for a full novel. This reviewer on Amazon loved the world-building and attention to detail. $10.00, including postage.

The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Vol. 2-The webzine Heroic Fantasy Quarterly bought my Viking-monster story "Nicor" back in 2013 and later bought the anthology rights for two years. The collection includes 22 stories, only one of which is mine. I've been selling this at conventions alongside Thing and later books for many years and still have a few copies left. $10.00, including postage.

I can be reached via e-mail at mquinn1984@gmail.com to work out mailing arrangements. Payment via PayPal or Facebook.

THE ATLANTA INCURSION Cover Art Phase #1 and Phase #2

Although my first novel The Thing in the Woods stands on its own, most of my ideas for standalone stories tend to sprout sequels. Thing is no different. I've been working on its sequel, The Atlanta Incursion, for several years now and I intend to independently publish it in the next few weeks. The complicating factors are that I'm independently republishing Thing due to changes at the publisher and waiting for the cover art to be done so I can have a full cover designed. Only after that can the print and e-book be created.

In the meantime, here's the first phase of the cover by Matthew Cowdery:

And here's the second:

I sent him some clarifications about what the Grays' eyes, guns, stargate, and other technologies should look like and he's working on them now. If you want an idea of what the finished cover will look like, here's some previous work he's done for me:

Battle for the Wastelands

"Son of Grendel" (forthcoming)

Second full novel (tentative title "Serpent Sword")

Selling My Own Books, In-Person or Online

I once heard the reason Taylor Swift is so rich is that she knows that musicians don't get most of their money from record sales, but from touring. And she likes to tour. Consequently, she is probably one of richest 30-somethings on the planet rather than some forlorn artist who made a lot of money for the record label but not much for themselves.

The same logic applies to books. Once the retailer, distributor, and publisher get their share (and I'm not faulting them for wanting to be paid for their portion of the work, especially low-margin small presses), there's less for the author. One solution for authors looking to make more money, therefore, is to sell direct. I've heard of more complex methods of doing this, such as selling bookmarks with a QR code linked to a one-time e-book download, but the method I settled on was buying lots of my stock wholesale from the publisher and hitting up event like science fiction conventions, gun shows, local festivals, etc.

Then I moved onto selling directly online, selling my wholesale copies of Little People, Big Guns and Battle for the Wastelands to people I knew online or in real life. Some bought through Amazon, while I made individual arrangements via PayPal or Facebook (which now has a "send money" option).

That's come in particularly handy this weekend, which was supposed to be the Atlanta Sci-Fi and Fantasy Expo. I first attended that event in 2018 and that was the first event where I sold through a complete print run of The Thing in the Woods. The second event in 2019 was less successful because the only new thing I had was The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Vol. 2, in which I had only one story and people from the previous year were expecting new stuff. I was looking forward to this year's event because I had new books like Battle, LPBG, and my reissued short-story collection Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire, but then the coronavirus outbreak happened.

(Not really blaming them for canceling--not only do medical professionals recommend avoiding large crowds at the moment, but on a more self-interested level if they went through with it, attendance numbers would likely crater and nobody would make any money. Better to wait.)

So although it's unfortunate the event got canceled, I've got the infrastructure in place to sell signed copies to anybody in the United States. If you'd like anything of mine signed, e-mail me (mquinn1984@gmail.com) or contact me via Twitter (@MatthewWQuinn) and we can work something out via PayPal, VenMo, or Facebook.

One person has already contacted me about a two-book deal, so let's get this going. :)

Putting Novellas In Packages...

At some point in the next few months, I'm going to put out a new novella "Son of Grendel," which is set in the world of my novel Battle for the Wastelands roughly a year or so before the book begins. The cover has already been completed by artist Matt Cowdery, who did the cover for Battle and the upcoming sequel.

However, in order to get 70% royalties on Amazon, one has to charge $2.99 or more per book. That's easy to justify with a full novel, but harder with a shorter work. A 70% royalty on a $2.99 e-book is $2.10 or so, but 35% royalty on a $1.99 e-book is $0.70. That's no way to make money. And if I've got a quality cover and had the formatting done professionally, that's a lot of costs to cover even at a higher royalty before I make a profit.

Consequently, although I'm going to release "Son of Grendel" as a standalone since most of the work has already been done (I just need to do writing group revisions, perhaps add a couple new scenes, and then have it formatted for e-book), future novellas set in the worlds of Battle or The Thing in the Woods will be released in packages of three.

(I've got to give credit to Delilah S. Dawson, Kevin Hearne, and Chuck Wendig for the concept--they released three novellas in a package called Three Slices.)

Not only can putting three novellas together into something approximately novel-length justify charging a novel-equivalent price, but I can print the book to sell at conventions. That's how I make most of my writing money anyway, so having more to sell is always a plus.

I even have ideas for what the first three-novella package will look like. It'll be entitled Warriors: Three Novellas of the Wastelands or something to that effect and will feature the following stories:

*I'd lead with "Son of Grendel," since it would be the first one published. Falki Grendelsson, heir to the first lord of the Northlands, is sent on a counterinsurgency mission and things don't go according to plan.

*Next comes "Ruled in Rage," which is approximately a fifth written right now. It's Grendel's origin story--how he adopts the name, how he meets his right hand Alexander Matthews, and how he begins to walk the trail of blood that will someday make him the ruler of the known world. Although he's in his teens, we'll see a lot of the traits that mark him in middle age--his cunning, his lechery, etc. The title is an allusion to Beowulf, which is heavily tied into the Wastelands' series overarching plot.

*The third novella is tentatively titled "A Valkyrie Is Born," but that's probably going to change. The Valkyries are part of Norse mythology and thus more associated with Grendel and his Sejeran (Norse) allies, plus the title is a bit on the long side. This is a story of Alyssa Carson, Andrew's love interest from the first book, and her family's...grotesque...encounter with the cannibalistic Flesh-Eating Legion after the fall of the Merrills.

*Alternatively, the third novella could be "A Creature of the Fall." This one takes place over a decade before Battle and will feature Alonzo Merrill in his very early teens and his serious-minded elder brother John. There will be battle with the Flesh-Eaters, a great big hint as to what happened to end the Old World, and perhaps the dirigible bombing of the Flesh-Eater capital that gives their overlord Jasper Clark such a massive grudge against the Merrills.

Given the potential for some of these stories to grow into full novels (most likely to happen with "Ruled"), having different options for the third novella is always a good idea. I could make a package of four--two stories from the villains and two from the heroes--but that'd risk it getting too long. Realistically I'd probably save "Creature" for a future installment, especially since including an Alyssa story would prevent the collection from being a boys' club and I want to foreshadow the reason for the Fall closer to the final book.

Next Events: Augusta Toy and Comic Show, Ringgold Next Chapter Con, and Atlanta SFF Expo

Although I had several events lined up for the spring and summer, COVID-19 has knocked my convention game on its heels. The Atlanta Comic-Con, historically my biggest earner, was delayed until 2021, while the Atlanta Sci-Fi and Fantasy Expo, the occasion for the original version of this post, was delayed until the summer and then as of now November (more on that later). Fortunate, I'm not out of the game yet. I attended a Dalton-based event called ConFinement (hee-hee) in June and I've got events slated for September and November.

My first event will be the Augusta Toy and Comic Show, September 5th and 6th in Augusta, Georgia. I have some relatives in town I can stay with, so I won't have to worry about hotel expenses. I've historically done very well at comic events, but people who go to toy shows typically aren't interested in books. This will be the official premiere of The Atlanta Incursion (the sequel to The Thing in the Woods) and the print version of "Son of Grendel" (short prequel to Battle for the Wastelands) so hopefully I'll be able to make a lot of "two for $20" cash deals.

My next event will be the Next Chapter Con in Ringgold, GA, near the Tennessee border on September 19. Last year I served as a panelist and made both a great deal of money (I don't remember how much) and got a lot of e-mails for (my semi-monthly newsletter). And that was with only two books, Thing and The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Vol. 2. This time around I've got a bunch more inventory to sell and I'll be able to notify people who'd attend last year in advance that I'll be coming. I'm definitely looking forward to this one.

Finally, I'll be coming to The Atlanta Sci-Fi and Fantasy Expo for the third time. The first time I attended I sold an entire print run of The Thing in the Woods, but the second time was less lucrative--a lot of people had bought books at the last one or at other events asked if I had anything new to sell. Well now I've got a lot more to sell--Little People, Big Guns,Battle for the Wastelands, "Son of Grendel," and Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire in addition to my remaining stock of The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Vol. 2. Based on some e-mails I've exchanged with the convention organizers, the event will be broken up across several weekends in November and I'll be attending one of those. Hopefully I'll be able to coordinate my stuff with relevant or popular panels, plus I've got visitors from the last couple years on my newsletter list.

So even though COVID wrecked my summer convention schedule, I might still be able to make bank this fall, especially with my larger inventory. Fingers crossed!